Statement: Recommit and resource the power of women and girls to transform the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) response

 

This World AIDS Day comes amid deep uncertainty, and this year’s theme, “Overcoming disruption, transforming the AIDS response”, is a clear call to action: the world must step up, not step back.

Gender inequality continues to fuel the AIDS pandemic. Today, 53 per cent of the 40.8 million people living with HIV are women and girls. In sub-Saharan Africa, adolescent girls are acquiring HIV at six times the rate of boys. Violence, unequal access to healthcare, and limited opportunities for leadership all contribute to this crisis—and women continue to bear the brunt of care and support responsibilities.

These inequalities are now deepening. Cuts in global funding threaten to reverse decades of progress, shrinking the very programmes and resources that protect and empower women and girls. But women living with HIV are not victims—they are advocates, leaders, and change-makers. Their voices must be heard, their rights upheld, and their leadership fully resourced.

Against this backdrop, UN Women continues to act. In 2024, we strengthened the leadership capacities of more than 35,000 women in 36 countries and expanded access to prevention and treatment through community-based services, including outreach and legal empowerment across Africa and Central Asia.

The Beijing+30 Political Declaration reaffirms its commitment to women’s health as a critical area of concern of the Beijing Platform for Action and pledges to advance the health rights of all women and girls.

This World AIDS Day, let’s recommit. We must reverse disinvestment, centre gender equality and human rights in the AIDS response, and maintain political will for prevention, care, and treatment. That means increasing domestic funding, ending violence, and supporting the networks of women whose leadership is transforming lives.

AIDS is not over—and neither is our fight. Now is the time to protect what we’ve achieved and push forward, together.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of UN Women.