Alicia's Aids Message

Alicia Keys is delivering a pre-Christmas (04) message about the ravages of AIDS around the world in an upcoming editorial for music industry trade paper Billboard.

The R+B star asked to be given space for a commentary in the 4 December (04) issue of the magazine - to coincide with World AIDS Day on 1 December (04).

She writes, "Just for a moment imagine the media hysteria and global outrage if 25 million Americans, many of them children, died from a treatable disease because the medicine was too costly.

"Imagine if another 42 million people were infected and had no hope of paying for life-saving treatment... This is exactly what is happening throughout sub-Saharan Africa."

Keys recently travelled to Africa on an awareness trip with charity UNAIDS and now she's committed to raise cash and awareness for AIDS charities in Africa.

In her commentary, she adds, "The disease is more than a humanitarian catastrophe. It is a moral crisis that is beginning to destroy whole countries."