Across Africa, members of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP) alliance today welcomed the prioritization of poverty reduction in President Mbeki’s State of the Nation address but warned that there needed to be follow through.

“President Mbeki needs to be mindful of the gap between policy pronouncements and actions on the ground so this is not just more empty hype. He signed onto the Millennium Development Goals in 2000, and so far his obligations to the people of South Africa have not been fulfilled. Current levels of poverty and inequality in South Africa are unacceptable and we want to see a delivery plan to match the rhetoric.” Said Christophe Zoungrana, GCAP Africa Coordinator on behalf of the GCAP African Facilitation Team President Mbeki’s call for a "national war room for a war against poverty”, bringing together government departments, provincial and local administrations as well as NGOs and business, is a step in the right direction.

The world's biggest AIDS conference closed in Sydney last Wednesday with a call for antiretroviral drugs developed specifically for HIV-infected children.

An estimated 2.3 million children are HIV infected, with around 600,000 new infections each year. Without treatment half of all babies infected will die before their second birthday. Now, only about 15 percent of HIV infected children receive antiretroviral drugs.

Children now receive adult-designed drugs in cut-down dosages. "Most of the world has been forced to split adult tablets into child-size pieces," said Dr Annette Sohn, an expert from the pediatric infectious diseases division at the University of California in San Francisco. Under or overdoses can lead to treatment failure or put children’s health to risk.

With the upcoming opening of a new session of the United Nations General Assembly in September, a coalition of more than a million young people from around the world are preparing to ask their leaders to take a stand on global health issues.  As a United Nations intern who represents and reaches out to youth, I see this as an important chance to let young voices be heard.

Youth For Health and Global Youth Action on Tobacco are two youth organizations committed towards making lasting changes to promote safer health policies for young people. The groups will will speak before the Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon with a charter on youth, health, the environment, and development.

The groups claim the present health policies have a negative effect on youth.  The impact of problems such as global warming or the HIV/AIDS pandemic will most greatly affect young people in the future.   The charter devised by young people includes the following reforms for governments:

At a meeting  of HIV/AIDS experts in Sydney, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, announced that more people are becoming infected with HIV than are currently being treated. This is disappointing news in the global progress toward achieving Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 6 to combat HIV/AIDS, as the world acknowledges the halfway point of the goals this year.

Although nearly two million more HIV/AIDS patients have access to anti-retroviral drugs than three years ago, new infections are spreading faster than the global campaign to treat and educate patients. There are six new infections for every one person that receives treatment. According to World Health Organization statistics, only 28% of the world's HIV/AIDS patients receive anti-retroviral drugs.

The Fourth International AIDS Society conference, attended by 5,000 delegates from 133 countries, also addressed the extremity of the problem in Asia and Africa.

What would you say if you had the chance to speak to the President? I pondered this question as I stood by the elevator yesterday morning, directing Fortune 500 members, government officials, and various NGO leaders up to the VIP reception. President Bush would be delivering a speech at 10:10 AM to introduce his proposal to double AIDS money for developing countries, and I was a lucky volunteer who would get a seat at the conference as a reward for my ushering efforts. “Mezzanine level,” I repeated dozens of times that morning, as my mind wandered over towards that hypothetical conversation.

In the 25 years since Aids has been with us, an awful lot of promises have been made by the world's most powerful people to tackle the epidemic. Government leaders, the UN, the World Health Organisation and other bodies have pledged to pour money and other resources into taking on the scourge of the latter part of the 20th century in the hope that it won't blight too much of the 21st.