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Congress Gets Another "Wake-Up" Call for HIV Prevention

By Pat Nixon

Following the revised HIV incidence numbers released this summer that showed a higher number of Americans becoming newly infected with HIV each year than previously estimated, the Congressional House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform convened an emergency hearing on September 16th to address our national HIV prevention efforts, which have been crippled by underfunding and regressive politics. Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA) chaired the hearing entitled "The Domestic Epidemic is Worse than We Thought: A Wake-Up Call for HIV Prevention", and more than 100 congressional staffers, HIV prevention advocates, including CHAMP staffers Vanessa Brocato and Coco Jervis, and expert HIV/AIDS related academicians and scientists attended.

The hearing highlighted the devastating toll the epidemic has had on communities nationwide and demonstrated the need to fully fund innovative research and programs, including effective behavioral and biological interventions, along with programs that address structural factors that exacerbate HIV vulnerability. Echoing the 'disparities of HIV are driven by structural factors' credo that has been CHAMP's rallying cry for years, Dr. Julie Gerberding, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), called for more to be done to address "prevention barriers such as complacency, stigma, homophobia, and substance abuse that allow this disease to continue to spread." Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Dr. David Holtgrave, professor and founding chair of the Department of Health, Behavior and Society at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, also discussed homelessness, poverty and mass incarceration – factors that drive the HIV epidemic in certain communities.

Pinpointing underinvestment in HIV prevention as a key obstacle, Representative Waxman noted that, in adjusted dollars, "the CDC's HIV prevention budget has dropped more than 20% since 2002." And as articulated in the CDC's professional judgment budget, Dr. Gerberding called for an additional $877 million in FY 2009 and an additional $4.8 billion in order to fully implement effective HIV prevention in the United States over the next 5 years –almost double the amount that the Bush Administration has requested. During CHAMP's October 15th Strategy Lab teleconference, Vanessa Brocato lauded Representative Waxman for convening an HIV prevention hearing that squarely addressed the social and economic roots of the epidemic and called on advocates to push hard for the "whole, necessary funding pie" during the next round of appropriations.

For an in-depth discussion on efforts to ramp up HIV prevention funding in the next administration, please be sure to tune in on Wednesday November 12th (4-5:30pm EDT) for CHAMP's Special Post-Election Strategy Lab and Community Teleconference – The Election and the Epidemic: Aiming Higher for HIV Policies in the Next Administration and Congress?