Barbara Lee Outlines Bold Agenda for Fighting AIDS on the Eve of World AIDS Day
(Oakland, CA) – Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Oakland), long recognized as a Congressional leader in the fight to stop HIV/AIDS, outlined a bold agenda for fighting the global HIV/AIDS pandemic for the incoming Democratic Congress on the eve of World AIDS Day (December 1st):
“This World AIDS Day, as we once again recognize the challenges that loom ahead of us, we cannot forget the faces that lie behind these statistics. Each of the 4.3 million new infections and the 2.9 million deaths that occurred in 2006 represent real people with families and friends who love them, depend on them, and who mourn their loss. It is for those who have already died of this disease, the millions who live with it, and all those who continue to remain vulnerable that we must follow through on the theme of this year's World AIDS Day, to ‘Stop AIDS. Keep the Promise.’
“I will work with my colleagues in the new Democratic Congress to ensure that the United States government is an effective partner in the fight to end AIDS.
“In the United States we must address the critical shortfall in funding for basic prevention, care, and treatment services, and take serious action to stop the growing spread of this disease among minority populations and women.
“We can start by strengthening and re-authorizing the Ryan White CARE Act early in the 110th Congress, and ensuring that it provides the necessary funding and services to everyone who needs them.
“We can also ensure that our kids are given the tools to protect themselves by passing the Responsible Education About Life (REAL) Act, legislation I introduced to give states the chance to provide comprehensive sex education in our schools.
“But we must also begin to take on the structural factors like poverty, homelessness and hunger that continue to put people at risk of infection. One of our first steps must be to pass comprehensive legislation to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections in our prisons. We can no longer to continue to hide our heads in the sand about the fact that HIV is spreading among incarcerated persons.
“Globally, we have led the charge in expanding access to prevention, care and treatment services with our partners. Our job now is to ensure that those programs are effective, evidence-based, and accountable as we move towards making those services available to all who need them.
“We must eliminate the ideological barriers to comprehensive prevention services which hinder our ability to respond to local needs. We must pass my bill, the Protection Against Transmission of HIV for Women and Youth (PATHWAY) Act to eliminate the 33% abstinence-only-until-marriage earmark in our global AIDS legislation and to empower women and girls and eliminate the factors that increase their vulnerability to this disease.
“The latest estimates from UNAIDS are clear: this epidemic continues to grow and it continues to kill. The United States must continue to show leadership and provide the resources to combat this devastating disease. I will be working with the new Democratic majority in the United States Congress to ensure that we are doing our part, so that we can reach the goal of universal access to care and treatment for all people living with HIV/AIDS by 2010.”
In the upcoming Congress, Lee plans to reintroduce legislation to repeal the abstinence-only-until marriage earmark in federal law and develop a plan to address the vulnerability of women and girls to HIV infection in developing nations (HR 5674, the PATHWAY Act), and to combat the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections in the US correctional system (HR 6083, the JUSTICE Act).
Lee’s accomplishments in promoting effective, bipartisan measures to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS and bring treatment to the infected have earned her recognition both at home and abroad as a leader in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Lee was a leader in the bipartisan effort to designate $15 billion for the prevention, care, and treatment of HIV/AIDS, TB, and malaria. She authored the bill to establish the framework for the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS and sponsored legislation that allows impoverished countries to purchase generic, cheaper HIV/AIDS drugs. In 2005, she successfully passed and the President signed into law legislation to focus U.S. foreign assistance on the impact of AIDS on orphans and vulnerable children in developing countries.
###