Global AIDS Fund comes up far short

The Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is far short of the cash it needs to do its job, despite promises of money from the United States, a US Government report said on Wednesday. The fund, set up to bypass bureaucracy and get money straight to those hit by the three worst infectious diseases in the world, is ‘‘threatened by a lack of resources,’’ the General Accounting Office report said.

AIDS activists accused US President George Bush of exaggerating how much the US had contributed to the fund, and fund officials said they were working to get other countries to contribute enough to keep it going.

The fund was set up by the UN and G8 group in 2001. It has asked for $3.5 billion a year from the US. The United States gave $200 million last year and Bush’s plan would add $200 million a year. The GAO said the lack of funding would hurt the plans to get drugs to fight HIV to 500,000 patients and care to 5,00,000 children orphaned by AIDS. Together, AIDS, TB and malaria kill 6 million people a year around the world.