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Global Health Matters >
World AIDS Foundation's Work Draws to a Close
World AIDS Foundation's Work
Draws to a Close
It was a bittersweet moment when the World AIDS Foundation (WAF)
celebrated its accomplishments at a scientific symposium convened
last July at the Institut Pasteur in Paris. The Foundation was created
in 1988 to help combat and prevent HIV/AIDS in developing countries
through research and education. Its funds were derived solely from
royalties on the sale of blood tests devised to detect antibodies
to HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The patent on these tests expires
in April 2004, ending royalty payments and, as a consequence, the
granting of new WAF awards.
"WAF has had an enormous impact," said Kenneth Bridbord, M.D.,
Director of FIC's Division of International Training and Research,
who has been involved with WAF since its inception. "It carved out
a unique area in HIV/AIDS funding by focusing on training and by
building public health capacity in developing countries. It is a
tribute to all involved that they recognized quite early in the
epidemic that HIV/AIDS had the potential to affect developing nations
in a devastating way," explained Dr. Bridbord.
WAF was established following an agreement between Presidents
Jacques Chirac of France and Ronald Reagan of the United States.
The declared codiscoverers of the cause of AIDS, Robert Gallo, M.D., and Luc Montagnier, M.D., readily agreed that 25% of royalties
from the diagnostic test designed to detect its presence should
be used to help combat the growing pandemic. Dr. Gallo, who directs
the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland, said,
"The World AIDS Foundation was the first of its kind. We are all
proud to be a part of an organization whose sole goal was unselfishly
[helping] developing nations. It is a model not only for AIDS but
for how things can be done in many walks of life and all aspects
of medicine, and that is its legacy."
In its 15 years of operation, WAF granted $25 million in awards
to further the understanding of AIDS and stem its spread. It funded
more than 300 projects that have helped 80 developing countries
in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Far East and the
Pacific, and Eastern Europe, Russia, and the Newly Independent States
of the former Soviet Union. Most awards were for 2 years, and the
maximum for any single award was $150,000. Nearly half the grants
involved some form of collaboration with U.S. scientists to support
work in developing countries. Increasingly, WAF was making awards
directly to developing countries.
The largest number of grants awarded went to scientists from China,
India, Vietnam, Brazil, Nigeria, Peru, Ukraine, Cameroon, Thailand,
and Uganda, in that order. Although total funding was not nearly
as substantial as amounts currently offered by the Gates Foundation
or the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB, and malaria, WAF supported
efforts at a relatively early stage in the HIV/AIDS epidemic and
focused on areas not covered by these and other groups.
Examples of funded projects included the following: WAF facilitated
a confidential HIV/AIDS counseling and testing center in Tbilisi,
Georgia, and a program to prevent sexually transmitted diseases
(STDs) and AIDS in mining areas of Ghana. It funded programs for
safe blood transfer in Peru and AIDS prevention through literacy
and education in Malawi. In addition, it provided training for trainers
and peer educators for HIV/AIDS prevention in Turkey as well as
funds for researching a reagent in India for detecting anti-HIV
antibodies in a drop of whole blood.
Dr. Bridbord lauds the WAF grantees, calling them "the real heroes"
out front in the fight against AIDS. One hero he cites is Jean Pape,
M.D., a professor at Cornell University and the State University
in Haiti. Dr. Pape and colleagues, with the help of a WAF award
at a very early phase in Haiti's response to HIV/AIDS, enhanced
the activities of the Haitian Study Group on Kaposi's Sarcoma and
Opportunistic Infections (GHESKIO), a research center founded in
1982 by Haitian health professionals. Much of what is known about
the clinical presentation, epidemiology, and trans-mission of AIDS
in Haiti comes from studies carried out by GHESKIO, which today
receives walk-in and referral patients from throughout Haiti and
screens them for HIV, STDs, and tuberculosis. This and other WAF
awards helped Haitian health authorities establish their response
to the growing AIDS threat in their country.
Apart from providing financial support, WAF awards played a crucial
role in helping educate developing-world scientists and governments
on how to compete successfully in international grant systems. WAF
awards were among the first that developing countries received from
a research foundation on a competitive basis. It was a chance for
health professionals from developing countries, who had good ideas
but not much experience with grants, to present their ideas for
consideration and have a realistic chance of being funded.
FIC, first representing NIH and subsequently the U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services, played an integral role in WAF programs
from the beginning. Moreover, WAF projects spurred more than a dozen
FIC International HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis training and research
capacity-building programs in countries such as Poland, Mongolia,
Peru, and Rwanda. WAF programs also enhanced NIH-supported HIV/AIDS
programs in India, Russia, and South Africa and Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention-supported HIV/AIDS activities in the Congo,
Côte D'Ivoire, and Thailand.
WAF will continue to exist to support projects that have already
been awarded. It is anticipated that these projects will continue
for at least 2 more years. Funded projects have encouraged a cadre
of qualified, independent researchers in the developing world and
have helped prepare them to seek new sources of funding from major
international funding organizations. "It is our hope," said Dr.
Bridbord, "that the goals of the WAF will continue to be met, thanks
to the efforts of all the talented and dedicated people who have
been associated with this project over the years."
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