G8 Countries Failing to Live Up to Their Commitments

From DATA:

What’s clear from this report is that recent increases in effective assistance are already working, saving lives. What’s also clear is that the G8 are not yet doing enough—or what they promised—to build on this proven success. The G8 are completely off track on their trade promise to Africa and rates of increase are less than half what was promised on development assistance and the fight against HIV/AIDS. Thankfully, they have kept their debt promise. ...[T]he G8 must aggressively pick up the pace and offer not less than a $4b increase in development assistance to Africa in 2006 and each subsequent year through 2010. They also must demonstrate a far greater sense of ambition, urgency and focus on Africa in world trade talks.

Global Warming is the U.S.'s Problem to Fix

The United States is responsible for 45 percent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions. That means that there is no other nation contributing more to the problem, or more capable of taking steps to stop the impending climate crisis, than us.

The climate crisis is a global poverty problem. It's also a matter of our civilization's survival.

Buffett, Gates Focus Resources on Fighting AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria

Warren Buffett is giving most of his fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Learn more at The Washington Post site (registration only, sorry).

Learn more about how AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria affect extremely poor nations.

How Inconvenient

L. and I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth" this weekend. If you have not done so, go see it yourself.

The climate crisis may not seem like a poverty issue at first glance, but it is. Over the next few decades, if we continue our current course, no other factor will affect poverty and poor nations like global temperature change:

• The mosquito-friendly climate zones will grow, exacerbating the spread of malaria.
• Nations that depend on glacier runoff to feed their rivers will lose their fresh water supply as the glaciers melt and do not return.
• The global refugee crisis will worsen as rising seas displace millions of people from low-lying areas.
• Famines will worsen as a warming atmosphere leeches water from the soil.

To find out what you can do to help, join the Union of Concerned Scientists email list and visit stopglobalwarming.org.

Report Card for the Human Race

The third annual Global Monitoring Report on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is out. Take a look. See how we're doing.

MDG 6: WHO Gets Freaky in the Fight Against TB

From Reuters:

LONDON (Reuters) - The World Health Organization unveiled a new strategy on Friday to fight tuberculosis, an infectious disease that kills about 1.7 million people worldwide each year.

Millennium Development Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria and other diseases.

Control Arms: 100 Days to UN Meeting

From the OxFam email update:

Control Arms Campaign launches new report, and
begins 100 day countdown to critical UN meeting

According to a new report from the Control Arms Campaign, every one
of the 13 UN arms embargoes imposed in the last decade has been
repeatedly violated. And despite hundreds of embargo breakers being
named in UN reports, only a handful have been successfully
prosecuted. Control Arms campaigners from around the world will also
be marking 100 days to go until the UN world conference on small
arms in June. During the next 100 days, campaigners in 110 countries
will be holding marches, concerts and stunts to put pressure on
their leaders to support an Arms Trade Treaty.

Learn more.

Also, Amnesty International is staging visibility events to highlight how easy it is to get a gun in Africa: just like buying a pack of cigarettes.

"Difficult Decision" May Lead U.S. to Miss AIDS Relief Target

From the Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report:

The U.S. will not be able to meet its goals for treating and preventing HIV worldwide if Congress fails to meet the administration's fiscal year 2007 funding request for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, Mark Dybul, deputy U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator, told the House Foreign Operations Appropriations panel on Thursday, CQ HealthBeat reports (Reichard, CQ HealthBeat, 3/10).

PEPFAR is a five-year, $15 billion program that directs funding for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria primarily to 15 focus countries and provides funding to the Global Fund To Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 2/13). The program aims to prevent seven million new infections worldwide, provide antiretroviral drugs to two million HIV-positive people and provide care to 10 million people in the 15 countries most affected by the pandemic.

Dybul said FY 2007 "is the critical year to build capacity" to increase the number of HIV-positive people taking antiretroviral drugs. Dybul added that if Congress does not meet the administration's funding proposal, "no increase in funding the following year" will be able to fix the shortages.

Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.), chair of the subcommittee, did not commit to whether Congress would approve the requested PEPFAR funding, adding, "Budget resources across government are scarce and difficult decisions will need to be made." Kolbe added that the Global Fund is a critical element in the long-term success of PEPFAR (CQ HealthBeat, 3/10).

"Difficult decisions will need to be made." For who? For the wealthy who can already afford HIV/AIDS drugs and who are going to benefit from tax cuts that are forcing these "difficult choices?"

Political Language 101: Any time a politician talks about "tough choices" that need to be made, he's not talking about tough choices for his or her family. He's talking about tough choices for families that don't have the power to stop him.