UN's Nabarro tipped to head global AIDS fund

GENEVA, Feb 2: David Nabarro, a Briton who heads the United Nations' fight against bird flu, is the front-runner to lead a body dedicated to combating diseases including AIDS.

Nabarro was considered the strongest of three shortlisted candidates to head the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, Fund sources said yesterday. The other candidates are French AIDS envoy Michel Kazatchkine and Alex Coutinho, head of Uganda's AIDS Support Organisation.

Launched in 2002 with the backing of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the independent Fund raises and distributes billions of dollars a year to prevent and treat neglected diseases.

Its board, made up of donor and aid-receiving governments, as well as non-governmental groups, is due to select a successor for Britain's Richard Feachem at a meeting next Thursday.

A selection committee has evaluated the three nominees' qualifications and ranked ''Nabarro first, Kazatchkine second and Cotinho third,'' according to a Fund source.

But this did not mean that Nabarro, a medical doctor and a former senior official at the World Health Organisation, was guaranteed the job. In November, the board failed to agree on a candidate from among an earlier shortlist of five people, which had also included Kazatchkine.

Aides to Nabarro confirmed he had topped the new selection committee shortlist, but stressed he remained ''fully focused'' on efforts to fight and prevent the spread of deadly bird flu in humans. He was in Bangkok yesterday and will be in Indonesia today to work on pandemic preparedness, they said.

The five-year-old Global Fund has committed 7 billion dollars in grants to 136 countries, making it the largest international supporter of malaria and tuberculosis projects, and among the top three for funding programmes against AIDS.

Annan appointed Nabarro in 2005 to spearhead global efforts to try to prevent bird flu from sparking a pandemic in which millions of people could die.

AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria kill more than six million people a year, mainly in sub-Sahran Africa.

Reuters