UNAIDS Speeches

The last climb: ending AIDS, leaving no one behind

20 July 2014

My friends, let us not leave Melbourne thinking that it will be easy to reach the summit. Complacency will cause us to stumble. Will future generations say that we squandered the opportunity of a lifetime? I know the path will be steep and the obstacles many. Let us do this in memory of our colleagues who died en route to Melbourne and the millions who have died of AIDS-related illnesses and of the tens of millions of people living with HIV. If every person here tonight, and everyone working to end the epidemic, acts with the same sense of urgency, the same hope and the same commitment to fight for those left behind, we will scale this mountain. But only if we go arm in arm will we reach the top and the end.