Burkina Faso

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West African country/First official visit as Global Ambassador for the protection of mothers and children against the AIDS virus for the Global Fund (10-11 February 2009)

The figures are faces. Accompanied by Michel Kazatchkine, director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy chose Burkina Faso for her first official visit as ambassador for Global Fund to Fight AIDS. In this country in landlocked West Africa, 130,000 people have HIV/AIDS, more than half of whom are women. 10,000 children are living with the virus. Wedne sday February 11, 2009, in temperatures of 35°:visit to the Yalgado Ouédraogo University Hospital in Ouagadougou. She met women and children undergoing treatment, before going on to the headquarters of the National Council against AIDS (CNLS) to talk with the managers in charge of piloting the Global Fund to Fight AIDS. Later: lunch with heads of local NGOs who are fighting against the pandemic. In this Sahelian country, the rate of seroprevalence decreased from 7.17% in 1997 to 2% in 2005. According to the CNLS, the rate of seroprevalence in babies born to mothers with HIV decreased from 10.14% in 2005 to 4.4% in the first quarter of 2008. Before meeting the Head of State Blaise Compaoré and his wife, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy visited the laboratory of the health center in Pissy. Christine Kafando, manager of the associations fighting AIDS (MAS), said of this visit: “The Global Fund still needs €5 billion. As her husband is taking part in the G8 meetings, we are asking Mrs. Sarkozy to speak up on our behalf.”