President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief

The President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR/Emergency Plan) is a United States governmental initiative to address the global HIV/AIDS epidemic and help save the lives of those suffering from the disease, primarily in Africa.

The program initially aimed to provide antiretroviral treatment (ART) to 2 million HIV-infected people in resource-limited settings, to prevent 7 million new infections, and to support care for 10 million people (the "2–7–10 goals") by 2010. PEPFAR increased the number of Africans receiving ART from 50,000 at the start of the initiative in 2004 to at least 1.2 million in early 2008. PEPFAR has been called the largest health initiative ever initiated by one country to address a disease. The budget presented by U.S. President George W. Bush for the fiscal year 2008 included a request for $5.4 billion for PEPFAR.

The massive funding increases have made anti-retrovirals widely available, saving millions of lives. Critics contend that spending a portion of funding on abstinence-until-marriage programs is unjust while others feel that foreign aid is generally inefficient. According to a 2009 study published in Annals of Internal Medicine, the program had averted about 1.1 million deaths in Africa and reduced the death rate due to AIDS in the countries involved by 10%.