New York ( CNN ) -- For all the discord the Bush administration sowed on the world stage -- withdrawing from the Kyoto Protocol and various arms agreements , holding foreign nationals indefinitely at Guantanamo with restricted rights , generally disdaining multilateralism -- the previous president was rightfully celebrated for his commitment to fighting the global AIDS epidemic . In the four years following the unprecedented creation in 2004 of the funding mechanism known as PEPFAR ( President 's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief ) , Bush sent some $ 19 billion to Africa and other hard-hit parts of the world . How much has the Obama administration added this year ? Only $ 366 million beyond the prior year 's level . It does n't come close to the $ 1 billion a year the current president promised to add as a candidate . That Republican president Bush was a bigger advocate on AIDS than `` liberal '' Obama may come as a surprise , but many people around the world are starting to notice the discrepancy . That includes Desmond Tutu , the former archbishop of Cape Town and Nobel laureate . On Wednesday , Tutu took the president to task in a sharply worded New York Times op-ed that noted substantially fewer additional African HIV patients will receive treatment than did under Bush if the funding slack persists . Indeed , according to two Harvard researchers , if aid is n't substantially increased over Bush-era levels , an estimated 1.2 million avoidable deaths could occur just in South Africa over the next five years . That would happen on Obama 's watch . Domestically , the news is n't much better . When Obama rolled out his ballyhooed national HIV/AIDS strategy last week , there was no new funding attached , just a mandate to re-allocate existing funds to the communities most in need and the tactics that work best . ( For all his global generosity , Bush was rightly knocked stateside for prioritizing abstinence-based prevention approaches over condom-based ones . The needs of gay men , one of the most affected groups of Americans , were largely left out of the playbook altogether because of pressure from the Christian right . ) Read about men who have survived 30 years with HIV . But for all the innovative ideas in the strategy document , such as using social media to raise awareness of HIV/AIDS , what we really need is money . The federal/state AIDS Drug Assistance Program , which provides HIV drugs to more than 200,000 uninsured and underinsured people , has a wait list of some 2,300 people . And it 's growing monthly . That 's too many Americans going without medicines that can save their lives . Meanwhile , the number of people living with HIV/AIDS in the U.S. -- more than 1 million -- continues to rise . In some cities , the situation is as bad as parts of Africa . In Washington , 3 percent of residents have HIV/AIDS . Of course , in many parts of Africa , the statistics are much more dire . In South Africa , some 5.7 million people are HIV-positive . That 's 11 percent of the population . But you would n't believe how few federal dollars go to finding a cure : just $ 40 million in 2009 , according to the AIDS Policy Project . I know the country is lurching back from recession and funds across the board are tight . But if the administration can approve hundreds of billions of dollars for stimulus spending or health care reform -- let alone the countless billions of dollars wasted by a bloated intelligence infrastructure -- then the White House can certainly commit a fraction of these amounts to help out an even worthier cause : people 's well-being . It takes vigilance to beat back the HIV/AIDS scourge , to make sure people with HIV get the treatment they need to survive , and that people without the virus stay free of it . We 've made important strides in recent years . Just this week , the promising results of a South African microbicide trial were announced , meaning that down the road women may be able to protect themselves from the virus without a vaccine . But there 's still a lot to do . If America cuts back on aid , other countries will , too , because we 're the pacesetter . The Obama administration defends itself by saying the U.S. is the world 's biggest financial contributor to the fight against HIV/AIDS . As important as that is , we need to keep up with the epidemic , which requires more resources every year . Obama should listen to his fellow Nobel laureate Tutu , who helped lead his country out of apartheid , and lead the way on ending this scourge , both globally and here at home . After all , he wants posterity to judge him more favorably than Bush , right ? The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Sean Kennedy .
George W. Bush set standard for increasing Washington aid to fight AIDS , says George W. Bush . He says President Sean Kennedy has not lived up to his promise to add hundreds of billions of dollars more to the fight . Sean Kennedy says national commitment to fighting HIV/AIDS needs strengthening . He says Obama should respond to Desmond Tutu 's call for spending more on HIV/AIDS .