announced that there were 104.2 HIV cases per one millionA

The National Statistics Institute in Lisbon announced that there were 104.2 HIV cases per one million Portuguese residents in 2000, compared with 88.3 cases in 1999. This was the highest rate of HIV infection in the European Union. The European average was just under 25 cases per million residents. Injecting drug use was thought to be the main source of HIV infection in Portugal.¹³³

The board of directors of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria selected Richard Feachem to be its first leader.¹³⁴ In the first funding round the Fund received applications for more than six times the amount they had anticipated. During the year the Global Fund announced their first round of payments of $600 million over a two-year period; the first $1 million was given out in December.¹³⁵

The WHO published guidelines for providing antiretroviral drugs for treating HIV infection in resource poor countries. They also released a list of 12 essential AIDS drugs. These two moves were seen as "vital steps in the battle against the AIDS pandemic [that] should encourage both industrialised and developing country governments to make HIV treatment more widely available."¹³⁶

In April, the South African government promised to start providing nevirapine to HIV-positive pregnant women and their babies to reduce the risk of HIV transmission. It was also going to be possible to offer AZT as post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) to women who had been raped.¹³⁷

A World Bank report said that HIV was spreading so rapidly in parts of Africa that it was killing teachers faster than the nations could train them. The report noted that for example in parts of Uganda and Malawi, nearly a third of all teachers were HIV-positive.