Geneva: The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has released a crucial report highlighting a severe funding crisis threatening years of progress in combating HIV/AIDS. The 2025 Global AIDS Update report, titled ‘AIDS, Crisis and the Power to Transform’, underscores the urgent need for countries to adopt radical changes in their HIV programming and funding strategies.
According to South African Government News Agency, the report sheds light on the impact of sudden, large-scale funding cuts from international donors on countries most affected by HIV. Despite these challenges, the report also shares inspiring examples of resilience, with countries and communities stepping up to protect the progress made and advance the HIV response.
The report indicates that 25 out of 60 low and middle-income countries included have increased their domestic budgets for HIV responses for 2026. This increase amounts to an estimated 8% over current levels, translating to approximately US$180 million in additional domestic resources. However, UNAIDS stresses that this is promising but insufficient to replace the scale of international funding in heavily reliant countries.
Although significant progress was made in the HIV response in 2024, UNAIDS reported that a weakening consensus on aid and substantial funding shortfalls in 2025 caused widespread disruptions in health systems. These challenges led to cuts in frontline health workers, halted HIV prevention programs, and jeopardized HIV treatment services.
According to data, in Mozambique alone, over 30,000 health personnel were affected, and in Nigeria, pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) initiation plummeted from 40,000 to 6,000 people per month. If United States-supported HIV treatment and prevention services collapse, UNAIDS estimates that an additional six million new HIV infections and four million AIDS-related deaths could occur between 2025 and 2029.
UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima described the situation as a “ticking time bomb,” highlighting the loss of services, the dismissal of health workers, and the exclusion of vulnerable populations from care. The report notes that in 2024, 9.2 million people living with HIV were not accessing life-saving treatment services, including 620,000 children aged zero to 14 years. This lack of access contributed to 75,000 AIDS-related deaths among children in 2024.
In 2024, 630,000 people died from AIDS-related causes, with 61% of these deaths occurring in sub-Saharan Africa. Over 210,000 adolescent girls and young women acquired HIV in 2024, averaging 570 new infections daily. UNAIDS reports that HIV prevention services are severely disrupted, with community-led services being defunded at alarming rates. In early 2025, over 60% of women-led HIV organizations surveyed had lost funding or were forced to suspend services.
The report highlights South Africa as a beacon of hope, currently funding 77% of its AIDS response. The South African government plans to increase health expenditure by 5.9% annually over the next three years, including a 3.3% annual increase for HIV and tuberculosis programs. Several countries, including Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Namibia, Rwanda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, have achieved the 95-95-95 targets: 95% of people living with HIV know their status, 95% are on treatment, and 95% of those on treatment are virally suppressed.
UNAIDS calls for international solidarity to address the financing gap and support countries in closing the remaining gaps in HIV prevention and treatment services. The organization emphasizes that every dollar invested in the HIV response saves lives and strengthens health systems. Since the epidemic’s start, 26.9 million deaths have been averted through treatment, and 4.4 million children have been protected from HIV infection through vertical transmission prevention.
Byanyima concludes that in a time of crisis, the world must choose transformation over retreat to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, urging action with urgency, unity, and unwavering commitment.