Today the U.S. Government, through the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), announced that it is supporting life-saving antiretroviral treatment for approximately 1.73 million men, women and children worldwide, including nearly 1.68 million people in sub-Saharan Africa.

Together, PEPFAR and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria are supporting antiretroviral treatment for approximately 2.4 million of the 3 million people on treatment in low- and middle-income countries. These results also reflect the strong country-level partnership between PEPFAR and the Global Fund in support of host nations. The U.S. Government, as a founding member of the Global Fund and its largest contributor, continues to play a leadership role in ensuring the success of this essential international effort. Since 2001, the American people have invested more than $2.5 billion in the Global Fund, providing approximately 30 percent of its total resources.

“Only a few years ago, many doubted whether prevention, treatment and care could ever successfully be provided in resource-limited settings, where HIV was a death sentence,” said Ambassador Mark Dybul, PEPFAR Coordinator. “Today, while much remains to be done, the skeptics have been proven wrong. Millions of people are on life-saving anti-retroviral treatment in developing countries, and many millions more have benefited from prevention and care programs.”

Much remains to be done indeed, and the most pressing is the re-authorisation of PEPFAR by Congress where Sen. Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican, threatened to block the legislation because of its cost.

“Senator DeMint objects to a huge increase in deficit spending and the lack of real oversight to ensure funds are going for medical purposes to help those in need,” said DeMint spokesman Wesley Denton.

This budgetary consideration is of great interest when compared to another Presidential Emergency Plan, the Presidential Emergency Plan for Imposing Democracy (PEPFID) in country such as Iraq where recent estimates put the cost of the war between US$1.3 and US$3 trillions.

“The human mind isn’t very well equipped to make sense of a figure like $1.2 trillion. We don’t deal with a trillion of anything in our daily lives, and so when we come across such a big number, it is hard to distinguish it from any other big number. Millions, billions, a trillion — they all start to sound the same,” wrote David Leonhardt in The New York Times and then provides a few examples of what $1.2 trillion can buy.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a bit of the dough diverted from “PEPFID” to “PEPFAR”?

And here is a video from TED helping dealing with big numbers.

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