The UN General Assembly adopted on Friday an ambitious declaration with the goal of treating 15 million HIV-infected people with anti-retroviral drugs and eliminating mother-to-child transmissions of the virus by 2015. The 192-nation assembly's adoption of the 17-page declaration without a vote concluded three days of intense debate on ways to advance the global fight against the AIDS epidemic, which since 1981 has killed nearly 30 million people, according to a report of the German Press Agency "DPA". Despite preventive measures against mother-to-child transmissions, an estimated 370,000 infants were born infected with HIV in 2009. The declaration commits governments to demonstrate the political will to achieve the goals by 2015. "We believe that by 2015 children everywhere can be born free of HIV and their mothers can remain healthy," said Michel Sidibe, director of UN-AIDS. Sidibe said the new goals are "realistic and achievable."
