Bush wants to double commitment to fighting Aids in Africa

US President George Bush today urged Congress to authorise an additional €22bn to fight Aids in Africa over five years, double the current US commitment.

The money would provide treatment for 2.5 million people under the President’s Emergency Programme for Aids Relief, Bush said.

Through March 31, the programme has supported treatment for 1.1 million people in 15 countries, including more than 1 million in Africa, he said.

The programme’s original five-year mandate, which called for spending €11bn, expires in September 2008, and Bush asked Congress to renew it.

“When I took office, an HIV diagnosis in Africa’s poorest communities was usually a death sentence. Parents watched their babies die needlessly because local clinics lacked effective treatments,” the president said.

“Once again, the generosity of the American people is one of the great untold stories of our time.”

White House press secretary Tony Snow said the specific goals for the next five years – Bush leaves office on January 20, 2009 – are to treat 2.5 million people, prevent more than 12 million new infections and care for more than 12 million people, including 5 million orphans and children.

The president said: “This money will be spent wisely,” in nations where it can have the greatest possible impact and be sustainable.

Bush also announced that his wife, Laura, will visit four African countries - Zambia, Mali, Mozambique and Senegal – which have benefited from the US programme and will report back on her findings.

The trip will be made on June 25-29.

The president’s announcement comes before next week’s annual summit of industrialised nations in Heiligendamm, Germany. Germany is pledging to make Africa a central issue and is calling for more aid, further debt relief and improved financial oversight.