Congress OKs $48B for global AIDS
fight
By Jim Abrams
Associated Press
July 24, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) - The
House of Representatives voted Thursday to triple money to fight AIDS, malaria
and tuberculosis around the world, giving new life and new punch to a program
credited with saving or prolonging millions of lives in
The 303-115 vote
sends the global AIDS bill to President George W. Bush for his signature. Bush,
who floated the idea of a campaign against AIDS in his 2003 State of the Union
speech, supports the five-year, $48 billion plan.
Passage of the bill
culminated a rare instance of cooperation between the White House and the
Democratic-controlled Congress. It was "born out of a willingness to work
together and put the United States on the right side of history when it comes
to this global pandemic," said Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a leader on
the issue.
The current $15
billion act, which expires at the end of September, has helped bring lifesaving
anti-retroviral drugs to some 1.7 million people and supported care for almost
7 million. The President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, known as PEPFAR, has
won plaudits from some of Bush's harshest critics both in Congress and around
the world. Both Democrats and Republicans hailed it as one of the most
significant accomplishments of the Bush presidency.
The United States,
said Democratic Rep. Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, "has given hope to millions infected with the HIV virus, which
just a few years ago was tantamount to a death sentence."
According to a study
by UNAIDS and the Kaiser Family Foundation, the United States provided
one-fifth of AIDS funding from all sources in 2007 -- governments,
international aid groups and the private sector. About 40 percent of the $4.9
billion disbursed in 2007 from the G-8 countries, Europe and other donor
governments came from the
The legislation
approves spending of $5 billion for malaria and $4 billion for tuberculosis,
the leading cause of death for people with AIDS. It authorizes spending of up
to $2 billion next year for the international Global Fund to Fight AIDS. The
measure also provides $2 billion, on top of the $48 billion, for American
Indian water, health and law enforcement programs.
While some Republican
conservatives questioned the sharp spending increase, others said the
The pandemic, said
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, top Republican on the Foreign Affairs Committee,
"is leaving a trail of poverty, despondency and death which has
destabilized societies and undermined the security of entire regions." The
program has enhanced the
PEPFAR has focused on
nations in sub-Saharan Africa that have been devastated by AIDS, but it also
has provided aid in the Caribbean and other areas hit by the pandemic now
affecting some 33 million worldwide. Even with advances in treating the
disease, there remain about 7,000 new HIV infections every day around the
world.
The new bill, like
the current law, states that 10 percent of money should be allocated for
orphans and vulnerable children. It sets as a goal preventing 12 million new
HIV infections, treating more than 2 million with anti-retroviral drugs,
supporting care for 12 million people infected with HIV/AIDS and training at
least 140,000 new health care workers and paraprofessionals.
It increases
attention on women and girls, including stressing the importance of preventing
sexual violence.
Pamela W. Barnes,
president and CEO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, praised
the bill's target of reaching 80 percent of HIV-positive pregnant women with
services needed to prevent transmission to their children. "We are still
only reaching 34 percent of pregnant, HIV-positive mothers with the medicine
they need to keep their babies HIV-free," she said.
The final product
took months of compromise: Democrats took out a provision in the existing act
requiring that one-third of prevention funds be spent on abstinence education
but allowed for reports to Congress if abstinence and fidelity spending falls
below certain levels. Conservatives won "conscience clause"
assurances that religious groups would not be forced to participate in programs
to which they object on moral grounds.
Bush, who originally
proposed doubling the program to $30 billion, first balked at but later
accepted the $50 billion bill that passed the House in
April. The Senate diverted $2 billion of the $50 billion to American Indian
programs and inserted a provision that more than half of funds for AIDS
programs go for treatment and care.
The Senate also
attached a measure, welcomed by AIDS advocacy groups, that ends a
two-decade-old
The bill is named
after former House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairmen Henry Hyde, a Republican,
and Democrat Tom Lantos, who wrote the 2003 bill. Hyde died last November, and
Lantos died in February as he was working on the new bill.