July 22, 2003 PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) -- Haiti has become the first country in the world to implement a program spearheaded by U.S. President George W. Bush to stem mother-to-child HIV/AIDS transmission.
The mother-to-child program is a part of Bush's proposal to spend US$15 billion over five years to help the hardest-hit African and Caribbean nations battle AIDS and the virus that leads to the disease.
"Haiti was chosen because it is (the) readiest to go ahead," said U.S. Ambassador Brian Dean Curran, launching the program on Monday at the Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections Clinic.
The clinic treated more than 21,000 patients last year and has opened 25 treatment centers nationwide where people are tested and counseled.
Some US$4 million has been earmarked for the first year of the five-year program in Haiti. The United States expects to spend US$60 million on AIDS in Haiti over the next five years.
The program should affect as many as 1 million women every year and reduce the possibility of mother-to-child transmission by 40 percent within five years, officials said.
In that time, 850,000 mothers should be tested, and 25,000 given AIDS drugs, said Andrew Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development.
With at least 300,000 of Haiti's 8.8 million people infected, AIDS is the leading cause of death for sexually active adults. An estimated 30,000 died last year and many cases go unreported.
Every year, between 4,000 and 6,000 children are born with HIV.
The Caribbean has the world's second highest infection rate after sub-Saharan Africa. An estimated 2.3 percent of people, or 500,000, -- excluding Cuba where infections rates are low -- have HIV.
In the past two years, the United States has spent some $1.5 billion annually on AIDS and it will be increased to $3 billion a year under Bush's plan, officials said.
Haiti and Guyana were the two Caribbean countries selected for the Bush administration initiative.
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