与艾滋病作斗争，我们需要钱，我们需要药物。发展中国家以前如是说。唯一没有被强调的是“缺人”。

在墨西哥举行的第17届世界艾滋病大会上，这个问题被提了出来。

    路透社文章说：发展中国家存在着艾滋病医务人员的短缺，这种短缺是“可怕的”。受过训练的艾滋病医生和护士都跑到发达国家去了，在那里他们可以挣比在自己国家多好多倍的钱。

    在马拉维，一个照顾艾滋病人的护士一天才赚3美元。马拉维的人口艾滋病感染率已达12%，由于艾滋病的肆虐，该国的人均寿命已从62岁降到了39岁。

   联合国艾滋病规划署（UNAIDS）执行干事皮奥特说：有3百万艾滋病人吃上药了，但还有六百万人没有吃上。斗争远没结束。

   在莱索托，其180万人口中近1/4感染了HIV。这个国家只有不到100名训练有素的艾滋病医生，而实际需要可能高达400名。

   一个来自莱索托的艾滋病和结核病专家说，国际机构和捐助者一般不认为医务人员是遏制艾滋病传播的基本因素。  

   做任何事情，人其实都是第一位的因素。这个道理简单，可真正做起来，却难。

下面是路透社原文，摘自www.medscape.com。

More Health Workers Needed to Fight AIDS - experts

By Tan Ee Lyn

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) Aug 04 - Many developing countries that are combating AIDS are facing dire shortages of qualified doctors and nurses as healthcare workers leave for developed countries where they are paid many times more.

"We need to assist poor countries to train more health staff, provide commensurate salaries to enable them to live better lives and carry out their work," Moses Massaquoi, medical coordinator with Medecins Sans Frontieres in Malawi, told Reuters at a global AIDS conference in Mexico City.

The shortage of medical staff leaves HIV patients untended, to die without drugs that can keep them alive and healthy even if they do not offer a cure. Treating AIDS patients requires dedicated training, and most countries with a huge burden of the disease simply do not have enough of such professionals.

Peter Piot, executive director of the U.N. AIDS agency UNAIDS, echoed Massaquoi\"s comments at the conference, where international agencies, health officials, scientists, pharmaceutical companies and nongovernmental groups will discuss ways to stop the epidemic over the coming week.

"Three million people (globally) have access to drugs, but six million do not. AIDS is far from over," Piot said.

"There is a need to expand treatment to those who do not yet have treatment."

In Malawi, where 12 percent of the population of 12 million is infected with HIV, a nurse who cares for AIDS patients earns $3 a day.

Massaquoi said it was little wonder why half of those who need treatment, or 141,000 people, have not been able to get drugs.

"These people are uncared for because of the terrain of the country, and there are not enough resources to provide services," he said.

In Lesotho, 54 percent of nursing posts in public clinics and and 30 percent in hospitals are vacant, while nearly a quarter of its 1.8 million people are infected with HIV. Malawi has fewer than 100 trained AIDS doctors, while it needs up to 400.

Dr. Pheello Lethola, an HIV and tuberculosis specialist in Lesotho, said international agencies and donors tend not to see healthcare workers as being essential factors in the effort to stop the spread of AIDS.

"You need healthcare workers to administer the drugs. Without healthcare workers, drugs are useless," she said.

Over the past 10 years life expectancy in Lesotho has fallen from over 50 to 35, Lethola said.

"Average life expectancy in Malawi has fallen from 62 to 39 mainly due to AIDS. With fewer staff, it also means that people with other diseases are also not being taken care of," Massaquoi said.

UNAIDS says 33 million people are infected with the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS, and 2 million die of it each year.