The HIV Vaccines and Microbicides Resource Tracking Working Group was established in 2004 to generate and disseminate high-quality, detailed and comparable data on annual investments in preventive HIV vaccine and microbicide research and development (R&D), and policy and advocacy activities. These data can be used to monitor current levels of effort; identify trends in investment, spending, and research focus; identify areas needing more resources and effort; assess the impact of public policies aimed at increasing investment in new prevention technologies (NPTs); and provide a fact base for policy advocacy on R&D investments and allocations.
The Working Group is comprised of the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition (AVAC), the Alliance for Microbicide Development (AMD), the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).
To coincide with the current UNGASS review taking place this month, the Working Group has generated new estimates of public sector investment in HIV vaccine and microbicide research, development, and advocacy in 2005.
According to a preliminary report, the public sector invested an estimated US $654 million in preventive HIV vaccines and about US$ 139 million in microbicides in 2005. A full report on global investment in these technologies – including funding from philanthropic institutions and private industry – will be available in August 2006.
We have launched a new website at http://www.hivresourcetracking.org/ has this latest report as well as the reports published on each technology in 2005 along with PowerPoint slide presentations with the report results.
For more information on HIV vaccines, please contact the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition (avac@avac.org) or the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative(publicpolicy@iavi.org).
For more information on microbicides, please contact the Alliance for Microbicide Development (info@microbicide.org).
For more information on UNAIDS resource tracking activities, please contact the UNAIDS Resource Tracking Unit (rtdata@unaids.org).