WASHINGTON — “We can beat this disease,” President Barack Obama said Thursday as he committed to increase spending by $50 million on HIV and AIDS programs.
“We can win this fight. We just have to keep at it, today, tomorrow, and every day until we get to zero,” Obama said at an event that also featured musicians Bono and Alicia Keys as well as satellite link-ups with former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
Obama said he’s ramping up his goal of helping 4 million people receive treatment for HIV/AIDS by 2013 to a new target of 6 million people.
The spending increase Obama announced includes $15 million toward the Ryan White program, which supports HIV medical clinics, and $35 million toward state AIDS drug assistance programs.
Roughly 1.2 million Americans are living with HIV today, and about 600,000 more are infected each year, according to a White House statement.
The event was hosted by (RED), an organization that partners with companies to sell products whose proceeds support AIDS programs worldwide, and the One Campaign, which works to fight poverty and preventable disease.
Bono, who cofounded (RED) and the One Campaign, said the rest of the world should follow Obama’s example.
“It’s up to us now as we leave this building to make sure across the world that the leadership of the United States is followed through on by the leadership of our respective nations,” he said. “And we pledge to do that.”
Bono,echoing an op-ed he wrote that was published Thursday in The New York Times, that the biggest issue in the AIDS fight today is that even though the drugs to treat the disease are available, not everyone has access to them.