Student Activism: 'The Beginning of the End of AIDS'?

For the first time in 3 decades, the International AIDS Conference is being held on US soil July 22-27. In lieu of this important event, the ONE Campaign has launched a bold initiative to kickstart the 'Beginning of the End of AIDS' - a goal that can be reached by 2015 if the right actions are taken at this critical moment in time. 

What actions might these be? The first is to maintain funding for the AIDS program PEPFAR - created by President Bush and continued by President Obama - which has already amped up the number of individuals on life-saving AIDS medications from 50,000 to 5 million in the last 10 years alone. The second is to fulfill US commitments to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria, and Tuberculosis. Together these programs can reduce AIDS-related deaths and mother-to-child transmission to such a degree that we can actually see no child born with HIV by the year 2015. What's really remarkable is that the program funding necessary to make this groundbreaking statement makes up only 0.15% (less than 1 percent!) of the US federal budget. 

Grassroots initiatives to support this campaign have sprung up in cities across the nation - including Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan campus. So join me and UofM students in pressing our Michigan government representatives to ensure funding for these life-saving programs by signing the petition, writing a letter, or making a phone-call. Please visit www.one.org to learn more about the 'Beginning of the End of AIDS' campaign and how you can get involved. To inquire about any ONE Campaign events occurring around the Ann Arbor area feel free to email Mary Kate (me!) at mkcartmill@gmail.com.

ONE is a non-profit advocacy organization dedicated to fighting extreme poverty and preventable disease on a global scale. By engaging by-partisan support we can end extreme poverty in this lifetime.