James Chin, the leading AIDS epidemiologist at the World 91色情片 Organization,
is to leave next year. His will be the latest in a series of departures
by senior staff from the organisation鈥檚 Global Programme on AIDS.
The first director of the programme, Jonathan Mann, resigned last year
over differences with the WHO鈥檚 director general, Hiroshi Nakajima. Since
the appointment of Mann鈥檚 replacement, Michael Merson, the programme has
been radically overhauled.
Critics say the programme has lost its desire to provide authoritative
leadership and is suffering from poor morale. Merson鈥檚 supporters, on the
other hand, say he has made the team more efficient.
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Chin has led the programme鈥檚 unit of surveillance and forecasting, which
produces one of the programme鈥檚 most valuable services: regular figures
on the state of the AIDS pandemic and its projected increase. He denies
that his departure is related to the change in directorship, and says he
had always planned to leave once he had set up surveillance systems in the
WHO鈥檚 offices in Africa and Asia.
Others who have left include Manuel Carballo, formerly the leading behavioural
scientist at the programme. Jeff O鈥橫alley, who is responsible for funding
AIDS prevention programmes in developing countries, has also resigned.
Meanwhile Mann, who is now based at the International AIDS Center at
Harvard University, has set up a Global AIDS Policy Coalition with private
funding to sponsor research and advise national AIDS programmes. Mann says
the coalition is not intended to compete with the WHO鈥檚 programme but to
provide independent advice to countries of the kind that the WHO cannot.
