Rio de janeiro: Ghana must substantially increase domestic investment in HIV programmes and double annual HIV testing to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, the Ghana AIDS Commission (GAC) has said. An investment case developed by the Commission indicates that the target is technically achievable if annual HIV spending increases from about US$200 million to US$257 million by 2030 and the number of people tested each year rises from about two million to more than four million.
According to Ghana News Agency, Mr John Eliasu Mahama, Acting Director of Policy and Planning at the GAC, disclosed this in an interview on the sidelines of the 26th International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2026) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He said expanding HIV testing would enable earlier diagnosis and prompt initiation of treatment, while sustained investment would strengthen prevention, treatment, and care services required to achieve the global 2030 target.
Mr Mahama pointed out that Ghana's latest National AIDS Spending Assessment estimated annual expenditure on the HIV response at between US$125 million and US$130 million in 2022, highlighting a significant financing gap. He noted that HIV prevention and treatment programmes remained heavily dependent on external support, particularly for medicines and prevention commodities. More than 90 per cent of prevention spending still comes from development partners.
He also mentioned that although Ghana had not experienced the level of disruption seen in some African countries following recent reductions in United States funding, some interventions had been affected. Ghana previously received about US$14.75 million annually under the United States President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), while the Global Fund continued to provide between US$30 million and US$35 million each year, making it the country's largest external financier of HIV programmes.
Mr Mahama highlighted the Commission's HIV Response Sustainability Roadmap, which proposed measures to reduce dependence on donor funding. These included integrating HIV clinical services into the National Health Insurance Scheme, using allocations from the District Assemblies Common Fund to support community HIV prevention activities, and promoting local production of HIV medicines and other commodities. He stressed that expanding pharmaceutical manufacturing within Ghana and the West African sub-region would strengthen supply security and improve the long-term sustainability of the national HIV response.
He also called on the private sector to play a greater role in financing the HIV response through corporate social responsibility initiatives and strategic partnerships. Mr Mahama urged the Government, development partners, and the private sector to sustain collaboration to protect gains made over the past decades and accelerate efforts to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030 despite the changing global financing landscape.
The discussions at AIDS 2026 underscored growing concern over declining international health financing and highlighted domestic resource mobilisation, stronger health systems, and equitable access to prevention and treatment as essential to sustaining progress against HIV.