Quarles stresses the importance of basic education in the fight against AIDS. Photo courtesy of Jessica Quarles.

We've come a long way since December 1 was first declared "World AIDS Day" in 1988. Back then, AIDS was a relatively new, commonly misunderstood disease that left an estimated 5 to 10 million with the disease with little hope of long-term survival.

Today, despite major advances on testing, treatment, and mother-child transmission, HIV/AIDS is still outpacing us. We know how to prevent it, and yet last year an estimated 2.5 million people became newly infected with HIV. Only a fraction will be treated. Today alone, 6,800 people will contract the virus — the vast majority in developing countries.

So why, in light of all the progress we've made, is the number of new infections so staggering? The answer is access to the means of prevention — or the appalling lack thereof. A quarter century after the discovery of the disease we now call AIDS, fewer than one in five people at risk of contracting HIV has access to effective prevention.

Consider this: Fewer than 15 percent of young women in Southeast Asia — home to one of the highest rates of new infections — know how to protect themselves from infection. Worldwide, fewer than one in eight people at high risk can find a nearby clinic offering HIV testing and counseling. Fewer than one in ten people at high risk have access to condoms. And in Africa, where the majority of people living with HIV/AIDS are women, fewer than one in ten have access to treatments to keep their newborns from inheriting the virus.

A quarter century after the discovery of the disease we now call AIDS, fewer than one in five people at risk of contracting HIV has access to effective prevention.

In Zwedru, Liberia, a provincial capital carved out of the dense West African forest, several young people I met held dangerous misconceptions about how HIV is transmitted. Some told me it came only from people in neighboring Cote d'Ivoire, and that they could tell whether someone had HIV just by looking at them. Even those who did know how the disease spreads said the nearest place to get condoms was a town two hours away. To reach a clinic that offered an HIV test required more than a day's drive.

Thankfully, a year later, those same young people know a lot more about HIV/AIDS. Today more than 1,500 Liberian youth know how to prevent HIV — and how stigmatizing those with the virus makes it even harder to curtail its spread.

Together with Nike and an innovative non-profit group called Grassroot Soccer, Mercy Corps equipped Liberian soccer coaches with information on how to prevent HIV/AIDS and the skills to teach the young people they mentor. In short, soccer is helping people save their own lives.

Mercy Corps helps people deal with HIV/AIDS from China to Sudan to Zimbabwe, and we are driven by the belief that unless we step up efforts to halt the epidemic's spread, AIDS will derail broader efforts to improve food security, fight poverty and stimulate economic growth throughout the world.

It's estimated that universal access to effective prevention would avert 28 million new HIV cases in the next ten years.

World AIDS Day is a call to action. Today in Nepal, Mercy Corps is supporting an event hosted by Nava Kiran Plus — a group led by HIV-positive activists— to bring their prevention message to young people at risk. Here at home, you can get the word out in your community about what's at stake in the fight against AIDS, and join international efforts such as The ONE Campaign to lobby governments to spend more on access to prevention. It's estimated that universal access to effective prevention would avert 28 million new HIV cases in the next ten years, saving immeasurable suffering, loss of life and an estimated $24 billion in treatment expense - human and financial costs we simply can't afford.

A quarter-century into the battle against HIV/AIDS, there's a lot to be proud of. But success in the next quarter-century will not be judged only by the number of new drugs or prevention technologies, but also by the number of people with access to the basic tools of disease prevention. Because in the end there's only number that really matters: the number of lives saved.




Contributed by Jessica Quarles, Mercy Corps' HIV/AIDS program officer.

To read another Global Envision article about AIDS education through soccer, see Sports for Peace and Life.



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