The British government has pledged to give Nigeria 100 million pounds sterling to lift the African nation’s battle against HIV/AIDS. The pledge was made by the visiting British Minister for International Development, Mr. Ivan Lewis, in the capital city of Abuja on Monday. “The developed world has a responsibility to the developing world and that responsibility is about equality and fairness,” he said during a visit to the offices of the National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA). The money, according to the British Minister, will fund a multi-sectoral HIV/AIDS programme: ‘Enhancing Nigeria’s Response to HIV/AIDS (ENR)’, scheduled to run between 2009 and 2014. The project will help in encouraging sustained behavior change through social globalization, providing effective advocacy to reducing stigma and discrimination, building the capacity of civil societies and supporting the generation and dissemination of accurate information and data about HIV/AIDS. According to NACA Director-General Babatunde Osotimehin, Nigeria’s HIV prevalence rate has dropped from 5.8 percent in 2001 to 3.6 percent.
