Can 15 Billion Dollars for HIV/AIDS Go Unnoticed?

Sadly it appears so. Almost 4 in 10 Americans don’t know about U.S. global spending for HIV/AIDS! The Kaiser Family Foundation updated its Public Opinion Spotlights on HIV/AIDS, among other topics. The spotlight on the public's knowledge of the current administration's efforts shows that:

“Very few Americans - just 3% - are aware that the Bush Administration has more than doubled funding to fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic in developing countries. Many more Americans thought that U.S. spending on the global HIV/AIDS crisis has stayed about the same (23%) or decreased (22%) under the Bush Administration. Nearly four in ten (37%) said they didn’t know whether funding has increased or decreased over the past four years.”

Is this going to be a lost opportunity for the current administration and for the future of U.S. spending on global HIV/AIDS programs? It certainly would help if the American Public knew more about PEPFAR--not just the bad, but the good, too! Who is going to do that job? CGD's HIV/AIDS Monitor will tell part of the story about spending big money for HIV/AIDS, but much rests on PEPFAR and other donors to reveal how they do business with other countries for HIV/AIDS and what results--successes and failures--are achieved through these investments.