| (August 7, 2003) Washington, DC: Hundreds of people living
with HIV, activists and service providers from a coalition of AIDS organizations
protested during the 22nd meeting of the Presidential Advisory Council on
HIV/AIDS (PACHA). Activists demanded an end to President Bush’s attack
on effective HIV prevention programs that promote comprehensive sex education,
needle exchange, access to condoms, and other interventions that have been
proven to prevent the spread of HIV. Carrying bottles of “snake oil”
and coffins to dramatize the deadly impact of HIV policies motivated by
ideology, not science, the protesters rallied outside the meeting while
activists testified to PACHA members.
“Bush’s war on comprehensive, science-based HIV prevention efforts
are killing people of color in the United States—when 70% of new
HIV infections are among people of color,” said Amanda Lugg, of African
Services Committee. “This White House is ‘playing doctor’
to please reactionary conservatives—and jeopardizing millions of
lives on the process.”
The protest at the PACHA meeting comes one week after the annual Centers
for Disease Control HIV Prevention Conference where top Administration
officials were confronted with public criticism from activists and public
health experts alike, who predict the dramatic changes in HIV prevention
efforts will have dire impact. “This Administration is willing to
let people get infected with HIV in order to avoid talking honestly about
drug use and sex, and to cater to extreme conservatives,” said Jose
DeMarco, an HIV positive member of ACT UP Philadelphia. “Bush’s
new HIV policies have a body count—this is a matter of life and death.”
Protesters cite a litany of HIV prevention policy shifts as part of a
concerted effort by the White House to put narrow, reactionary ideology
ahead of proven best prevention practice. These include:
• a 66% funding increase for ineffective HIV prevention programs
that only teach abstinence; comprehensive HIV prevention programs are
being flat funded.
• persistent attacks on HIV prevention programs that target sexually
active gay men, and other communities unpopular with the White House
• pressure on NIH researchers to censor their funding proposals,
for fear that use of terms such as “sex workers,” “men
who have sex with men,” or “transgender” will mean rejection.
Experts are afraid that research that gets in the way of the ideological
agenda of the White House will not be funded.
• a sweeping new CDC prevention initiative, constructed with no input
from communities hardest hit by the AIDS epidemic, that will eliminate
funding for programs that work in keeping HIV negative people negative.
Instead, funding will shift to efforts to prevent people living with HIV
from transmitting the virus.
Louis Jones, a member of the NYC AIDS Housing Network who is living with
HIV and who testified to the Committee, said: “We need a President
that relies on science, not politics, in responding to this crisis. President
Bush must illustrate his commitment to protecting communities of color,
where HIV is spreading rapidly. His policies should be based on what has
been proven to save lives—the human cost of funding cuts is massive.”
Lavern Holley, a protester from CitiWide Harm Reduction and a board member
of the NYC AIDS Housing Network who is living with HIV, said: “We
need to continue to step up the pressure on this administration to ensure
full federal funding for HIV prevention and services, to prevent further
censorship of prevention research and to the reverse the government’s
policy of blocking access to condoms, needle exchange and other proven
prevention strategies.”
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