The International AIDS Society (IAS) on Sunday called on President Trump to increase funding for AIDS research, warning that his proposed spending cuts could cause deaths.

IAS president Linda-Gail Bekker spoke out at the group's conference in Paris against Trump's “draconian” research cuts, predicting they would result in “catastrophe,” Newsweek reported.

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"If we do not actively move forward on the HIV response, then we are sliding back. Sliding back means sick patients, lost lives, ongoing transmission and infected children — a world that we do not want to go back to,” Bekker said.

Trump’s proposed budget includes major cuts to global health programs that previously contributed to research against HIV and AIDS as well as other medical research. The U.S. contributed 66.4 percent of funding into the global fund for HIV research in 2015, Newsweek reported.

Globally, the total funding for HIV research declined by 8 percent between 2014 and 2015.