PEPFAR Reauthorization Passes House Committee by Voice Vote
PRESS RELEASE
BIPARTISAN
GLOBAL AIDS BILL HAS SUPPORT OF BOTH PARTIES, BUT ONLY DOES HALF OF
WHAT IS NEEDED IN FIGHT AGAINST GLOBAL AIDS PANDEMIC:
“As with all Compromises, we have to give up some of the things we needed”
- Committee Chair Berman
Contact: Kaytee Riek (267) 334-6984
February 27,
2008
For Immediate Release
The House Committee on Foreign Affairs announced a bipartisan compromise bill
to
reauthorize the President’s Emergency Plan to Fight AIDS (PEPFAR).
This compromise bill will replace the one that the late, great
Congressmember Tom Lantos originally proposed. The compromise, struck
by Committee Chair Berman, Ranking Member Ross-Lehtinen and the White
House, is a good starting place to ensure that the United States can do
it’s fair share to fight global AIDS, but as Committee Chair Berman
says, “compromises mean that we don’t get all of what we want” and in this case, all of what is needed.
“We
are excited that this bill has the support of both parties and of the
administration and that the President has agreed to fund the bill at
the minimum of $50 billion. However, we need to learn from the
past five years. The current bill needs to include the target
number of providing treatment for 4 million people who are going to die
without immediate treatment” said Kaytee Riek from Health
GAP. As it is written, the bill proposes to ensure
that only 3 million people are treated, which is one million less than
the number who would be treated by the United States’ commitment
to providing AIDS treatment to 1/3 of those in critical need.
“The US should do our fair share to train sufficient health workers to keep our promise to Africa. In order to do
this, we need to train and retain an additional 140,000 new health
professionals,” said Health GAP’s Jennifer Flynn, referring
to the UNAIDS estimate of the number of health professionals required
to achieve universal access to HIV treatment in Africa. “Without
this language, we are in danger of draining existing already
overburdened health systems.”
Representative Payne emphasized the importance of passing this bill in
time for the G8 meeting so that the United States can use our pledge to
ensure that other developed nations contribute their fair share to the
global AIDS fight.
Representative Chris Smith from New Jersey highlighted that the bill
still includes what is commonly referred to as the “Prostitution
Pledge”, the practice of requiring community based organizations
to sign a form that they
will not support prostitution. Experts have argued that this
requirement means that local groups have to choose between providing
treatment, services and support to individuals who engage in sex work
in order to survive
and ignoring those at higher risk for HIV infection.
Representative Ackerman from New York responded that saving the lives
of women who engage in survival sex is in the best interest of public
health.
The full House is expected to vote on the bill in the next two weeks.
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