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Kyrgyzstan’s MPs put vital HIV funding at risk [1]

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Date: 2023-05

Kyrgyzstan could lose out on $29 million in international funding for HIV prevention and treatment after MPs scrapped a working group for going against "traditional values".

Kyrgyzstan’s cabinet of ministers approved the dissolution of the country’s coordinating committee to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria after coming under pressure from hardline MPs at the end of April.

The MPs denounced the committee’s distribution of condoms to men who have sex with men as part of the HIV programme, which is largely financed by the Global Fund - the world’s largest funder of prevention, treatment and care programmes for these diseases.

That work, the cabinet’s deputy chair said, does not “correspond to national traditions” in Kyrgyzstan. In recent years, this sentiment has often been used to stifle debate about social issues, be it women’s or LGBTQ+ rights, by presenting them as threats to the country’s ‘traditional values’.

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The country’s coordinating committee is key to the work with the Global Fund and manages the grant. Shutting it means its latest application for $29 million in funding is at risk. Without it, a wide range of initiatives to prevent HIV and guarantee access to free healthcare for people with HIV and AIDS could end.

The news comes amid growing concern about pressure on civil society and independent media in Kyrgyzstan, where prominent civic figures have been imprisoned and the local outpost of US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has been blocked by court order.

Experts and people living with the condition told openDemocracy people will die if the funding is lost.

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[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/kyrgyzstan-global-fund-hiv-aids-programme/

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