World Disasters Report 2008 - Focus on HIV and AIDS

HIV and AIDS confront the world with many challenges. Humanitarian organizations have worked hard to meet them and to make up for a lack of action in the first years of the epidemic. But far, far more needs to be done, in partnership with governments but also, above all, with communities whose wisdom and resilience offer so much to the HIV response. That is why we have selected HIV as the theme for this year’s World Disasters Report. National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies around the world have come together in a Global Alliance on HIV with the resolve to do much more and much better in our collective endeavour against this epidemic. This commitment to scale-up is linked to specific and measurable targets to double, by 2010, the magnitude of our HIV programming in prevention, treatment, care and support, and in tackling stigma and discrimination.