USAID crisis leaves South Africans living with HIV in turmoil

Published

3 months ago

February 7, 2025

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A woman walks up to the security guards outside a shuttered USAID-funded sexual health clinic in Johannesburg’s inner-city district.

She looks around with confusion as they let her know the clinic is closed.

She tells us it has only been two months since she came here to receive her usual care.

Now, she must scramble to find another safe place for her sexual health screenings and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) – her regular defence against rampant HIV.

On the day he was sworn in as US president for a second time, Donald Trump signed an executive order freezing foreign aid for a 90-day period.

That is being challenged by federal employee unions in court over what it says are “unconstitutional and illegal actions” that have created a “global humanitarian crisis”.

However the order is already having an immediate impact on South Africa’s most vulnerable.

Her eyes tear up as she processes the news. Like many sex workers in town, free sexual health clinics are her lifeline.

An HIV-positive sex worker shared her patient transfer letter from the same closed clinic with Sky News and told us with panic that she is still waiting to be registered at an alternative facility.

South Africa is home to one of the world’s worst HIV/AIDS epidemics. At least 8.5 million people here are living with HIV – a quarter of all cases worldwide.

Widespread, free access to antiretroviral treatment in southern Africa was propelled by the introduction of George W. Bush’s US President Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) in 2003.

PEPFAR is considered one of the most successful foreign aid programmes in history, and South Africa is the largest recipient of its funds.

The programme has now been halted by President Trump’s foreign aid funding freeze – plunging those who survived South Africa’s HIV epidemic and AIDS denialism in the early 2000s back to a time of scarcity and fear.

“That time, there was no medication. The government would tell us to take beetroot and garlic. It was very difficult for the government to give us treatment but we fought very hard to win this battle. Now, the challenge is that we are going back to the struggle,” says Nelly Zulu, an activist and mother living with HIV in Soweto.

Nelly says access to free treatment has saved her and her 21-year-old son, who tested positive for HIV at four years old.

“It helped me so much because if I didn’t get the treatment, I don’t think I would be alive – even my son.

“My concern is for pregnant women. I don’t want them to go through what I went through – the life I was facing before. I’m scared we will go back to that crisis.”

South African civil society organisations have written a joint open letter calling for their government to provide a coordinated response to address the healthcare emergency created by the US foreign aid freeze.

The letter states that close to a million patients living with HIV have been directly impacted by stop-work orders and that a recent waiver by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio continuing life-saving assistance explicitly excludes “activities that involve abortions, family planning, gender or diversity, equality and inclusion ideology programmes, transgender surgeries or other non-life saving assistance”.

The shuttered clinic we saw in Johannesburg’s central business district (CBD) comes under these categories – built by Witwatersrand University to research reproductive health and cater to vulnerable and marginalised communities.

An activist and healthcare worker at a transgender clinic tells us everyone she knows is utterly afraid.

“Corner to corner, you hear people talking about this. There are people living with chronic diseases who don’t have faith anymore because they don’t know where they are ending up,” says Ambrose, a healthcare worker and activist.

“People keep asking corner to corner – ‘why don’t you go here, why don’t you go there?’ People are crying – they want to be assisted.”

South Africa’s ministry of health insists that only 17% of all HIV/AIDs funding comes from PEPFAR but that statistic is offset by the palpable disruption.

On Monday, minister of health Dr Aaron Motsoaledi met to discuss bilateral health cooperation and new US policy for assistance with US charge d’affaires for South Africa, Dana Brown.

A statement following the meeting says: “Communication channels are open between the Ministry and the Embassy, and we continue to discuss our life-saving health partnership moving forward.

“Until details are available the minister called on all persons on antiretrovirals (ARVs) to under no circumstances stop this life-saving treatment.”

A demand much harder to execute than declare.

“There is already a shortage of the medication – even if you ask for three months’ treatment, they will give you one or two months worth then you have to go back,” says Nelly.

“Now, it is worse because you can see the funding has been cut off.”

World

Nicusor Dan beats hard-right favourite George Simion in surprise win in Romanian election

Published

2 hours ago

May 18, 2025

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Nicusor Dan beats hard-right favourite George Simion in surprise win in Romanian election

Pro-Western candidate Nicusor Dan has unexpectedly beaten hard-right populist George Simion in the Romanian presidential election.

Mr Simion, 38, and his rival – a centrist who’s mayor of Bucharest – faced off in the second round of the contest.

According to the official tally, Mr Dan was leading by nearly nine percentage points with more than 98% of the votes counted.

After exit polls suggested he wasn’t going to win, Trump-supporting Mr Simion rejected the result and said estimates put him 400,000 votes ahead.

Speaking after voting ended, Mr Simion said his election was “clear” as he posted on Facebook: “I won!!! I am the new President of Romania and I am giving back the power to the Romanians!”

Romania’s last election was annulled after its highest court ruled the leading candidate, nationalist Calin Georgescu, should be disqualified due to claims of electoral interference by Russia.

The result is surprising because in the first round, 38-year-old Mr Simion, founder of the right-wing Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), took 40.96% of the vote – almost 20 points ahead.

An opinion poll on Friday had it much closer, but still suggested the two men were virtually tied.

Mr Dan, a 55-year-old mathematician, is running as an independent and has pledged to clamp down on corruption.

He is also staunchly pro-EU and NATO, and has said Romania’s support for Ukraine is vital for its own security.

When voting closed at 9pm local time, 11.6 million people – about 64% of eligible voters – had cast ballots. About 1.64 million Romanians living abroad also took part.

The election is being closely watched across Europe amid a rise of support for President Donald Trump.

After polls closed, Mr Dan said “elections are not about politicians” but about communities and that in the latest vote “a community of Romanians has won, a community that wants a profound change in Romania”.

“When Romania goes through difficult times, let us remember the strength of this Romanian society,” he said.

“There is also a community that lost today’s elections. A community that is rightly outraged by the way politics has been conducted in Romania up to now.”

World

Israel to allow ‘basic quantity of food’ into Gaza to avoid ‘starvation crisis’

Published

3 hours ago

May 18, 2025

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Israel to allow 'basic quantity of food' into Gaza to avoid 'starvation crisis'

Israel has said it will allow a “basic quantity of food” into the besieged enclave of Gaza to avoid a “starvation crisis” following a near three-month blockade.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the decision was “based on the operational need to enable the expansion of the military operation to defeat Hamas”.

Gaza, where local authorities say more than 53,000 people have died in Israel’s 19-month campaign, has been under a complete blockade on humanitarian aid since 2 March.

It comes as global food security experts warn of famine across the territory and after a UN-backed report issued last Monday which warned one in five people in Gaza were facing starvation.

The statement from the prime minister’s office said it would “allow a basic quantity of food to be brought in for the population in order to make certain that no starvation crisis develops in the Gaza Strip”.

“Such a crisis would endanger the continuation of Operation ‘Gideon’s Chariots’ to defeat Hamas,” it added.

“Israel will act to deny Hamas’s ability to take control of the distribution of humanitarian assistance in order to ensure that the assistance does not reach the Hamas terrorists.”

It comes after a British surgeon working in Gaza said in a video to Sky News the enclave is now “a slaughterhouse” amid Israeli bombardment.

Israel has just ramped up its offensive in Gaza, with Palestinian health officials reporting at least 130 people were killed overnight into Sunday.

Israel Defence Forces (IDF) confirmed troops had begun “extensive ground operations throughout the northern and southern Gaza Strip”.

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said 464 people had died in Israeli military strikes in the week to Sunday.

In a statement on Sunday, IDF said its air force struck “over 670 Hamas terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip to disrupt enemy preparations and support ground operations” over the past week.

Israel has launched an escalation to increase pressure on Hamas, seize territory, displace Palestinians to the south and take greater control over the distribution of aid.

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British surgeon working in Gaza says it is now ‘a slaughterhouse’ amid Israeli bombardment

Published

11 hours ago

May 18, 2025

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British surgeon working in Gaza says it is now 'a slaughterhouse' amid Israeli bombardment

A British surgeon working in southern Gaza has compared the region to a “slaughterhouse” because of the daily bombardment from Israeli forces.

Dr Tom Potokar, who is based at the European Hospital near Khan Younis in southern Gaza, offered his assessment of Israel’s military offensive after Palestinian health officials reported at least 130 people were killed overnight into Sunday.

Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have confirmed their troops have begun “extensive ground operations throughout the northern and southern Gaza Strip”.

In a video, Dr Potokar said it was “another day of devastation here in Gaza”, adding: “The stories coming from the north… absolutely horrific… particularly around the Indonesian Hospital.”

“I mean, it’s difficult to describe in words what’s happening here… [with the] constant sound of bombardment jets overhead.

“If Cambodia was the killing fields, then Gaza now is the slaughterhouse.”

His reference to Cambodia’s killing fields refers to when more than a million people were murdered in mass executions and buried by the extreme communist guerrilla group, the Khmer Rouge, under Pol Pot, between 1975 and 1979.

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said 464 people had died in Israeli military strikes in the week to Sunday.

Dr Potokar described the impact on those on the ground, saying: “We’ve been operating all morning so far and [treating] awful explosive injuries… [including] one young woman with leg fracture and shoulder fracture and a large wound on her buttock, who came in yesterday and is not yet aware that everyone in our family was killed in the onslaught.”

Israel has launched an escalation of its war in Gaza to ramp up pressure on Hamas, seize territory, displace Palestinians to the south and take greater control over the distribution of aid.

On Sunday, it announced and launched “extensive” new ground operations in Gaza.

It came after airstrikes killed more than 100 people, including dozens of children, overnight and into Sunday, hospitals and medics said, and forced northern Gaza’s main hospital to close.

A spokesperson for the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said: “Complete families were wiped off the civil registration record by Israeli bombardment”.

The ministry also said the bombardment had forced the closure of the Indonesian Hospital, the main hospital serving people in northern Gaza.

Nasser hospital, in the southern city of Khan Younis, said more than 48 people – mostly women and children – were killed in the area which includes tents sheltering displaced people.

In Deir al Balah, in central Gaza, at least 12 people were killed in three separate strikes, according to Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital and the Nuseirat camp’s Awda Hospital.

Meanwhile, the Gaza health ministry and the Palestinian Civil Defence – which operates under the Hamas-run government – reported that 19 people were killed in several strikes in Jabalia in northern Gaza.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the strikes.

Read more from Sky News:
How Israel has escalated Gaza bombing campaign

Ceasefire talks are taking place in Qatar this weekend – with Israel saying they involve discussions on ending the war as well as a truce and hostage deal.

A statement from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said any lasting truce must include the demilitarisation of Gaza as well as the exile of Hamas militants.

But a senior Israeli official added there had been little progress so far during talks in Qatar’s capital Doha.

Sky News Arabia reported Hamas had proposed freeing about half its Israeli hostages in exchange for a two-month ceasefire and the release of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

A Palestinian official close to the discussions said: “Hamas is flexible about the number of hostages it can free, but the problem has always been over Israel’s commitment to end the war.”