On the eve of the International AIDS Conference being held next week in Mexico City, President Bush signed into law the much anticipated PEPFAR Reauthorization Bill. The bill calls for a $50 billion U.S. commitment to fight HIV/AIDS across the globe. Although disappointingly the bill still promotes abstinence-only prevention programs, encouragingly the bill includes language that will help ease HIV/AIDS based travel restrictions in the U.S. This is a laudable, major piece of legislation that will undoubtedly save many lives.
Many pundits are calling PEPFAR, possibly the President’s foreign policy legacy. That may well be true. President Bush at the signing said “HIV/AIDS is still one of the world’s greatest humanitarian challenges, no question about it. But it is a challenge we’re meeting” (Dunham, Reuters, 7/30). Oh really? An interesting statement considering it was made in the White House, a building that literally sits just blocks away from the “belly of the beast”.
In the predominantly Black District of Columbia, 1 out of every 20 people (1/5 of the population) is HIV+. That is a incidence rate as high as some of the hardest hit locations in sub-Saharan Africa. The Black AIDS Institute this week released a report titledLeft Behind: Black America: A Neglected Priority in the Global AIDS Epidemic. It reflects that while America’s response to the global epidemic is record breaking, funds to fight the domestic epidemic have remained static.Left Behindalso states:
• Despite improvements in treatment, AIDS remains the leading cause of death for Black women aged 25-34 and the second leading cause for Black men aged 35-44.
• Black women are 23 times more likely than white women to have an AIDS diagnosis.
• Black gay men have more than twice the rate of infection than their white counterparts.
Left Behindpoints out that this administration has taken an obliviously neglectful and flawed approach to the domestic epidemic. New prevention paradigms must be developed. Campaigns with targeted messages that are not one size fits all and take into account all of the subsets that make up Black America need to be implemented. Anational strategy to end AIDSin this country is a must.
We as advocates must mobilize the community and stand as one, to fight this plague destroying our community, because one other thing thatLeft Behindshows us is that this administration telling Black America to “kiss its behind” when it come to HIV/AIDS.
On the eve of the International AIDS Conference being held next week in Mexico City, President Bush signed into law the much anticipated PEPFAR Reauthorization Bill. The bill calls for a $50 billion U.S. commitment to fight HIV/AIDS across the globe. Although disappointingly the bill still promotes abstinence-only prevention programs, encouragingly the bill includes language that will help ease HIV/AIDS based travel restrictions in the U.S. This is a laudable, major piece of legislation that will undoubtedly save many lives.
Many pundits are calling PEPFAR, possibly the President’s foreign policy legacy. That may well be true. President Bush at the signing said “HIV/AIDS is still one of the world’s greatest humanitarian challenges, no question about it. But it is a challenge we’re meeting” (Dunham, Reuters, 7/30). Oh really? An interesting statement considering it was made in the White House, a building that literally sits just blocks away from the “belly of the beast”.
In the predominantly Black District of Columbia, 1 out of every 20 people (1/5 of the population) is HIV+. That is a incidence rate as high as some of the hardest hit locations in sub-Saharan Africa. The Black AIDS Institute this week released a report titledLeft Behind: Black America: A Neglected Priority in the Global AIDS Epidemic. It reflects that while America’s response to the global epidemic is record breaking, funds to fight the domestic epidemic have remained static.Left Behindalso states:
• Despite improvements in treatment, AIDS remains the leading cause of death for Black women aged 25-34 and the second leading cause for Black men aged 35-44.
• Black women are 23 times more likely than white women to have an AIDS diagnosis.
• Black gay men have more than twice the rate of infection than their white counterparts.
Left Behindpoints out that this administration has taken an obliviously neglectful and flawed approach to the domestic epidemic. New prevention paradigms must be developed. Campaigns with targeted messages that are not one size fits all and take into account all of the subsets that make up Black America need to be implemented. Anational strategy to end AIDSin this country is a must.
We as advocates must mobilize the community and stand as one, to fight this plague destroying our community, because one other thing thatLeft Behindshows us is that this administration telling Black America to “kiss its behind” when it come to HIV/AIDS.