Civic Leaders Propose New Funding Approach on Global AIDS

AfricaAction
2001-06-12

New calls on Bush Administration for increased spending on HIV/AIDS programs in Africa.

Civic Leaders Propose New Funding Approach on Global AIDS

AfricaAction
PRESS RELEASE
June 11, 2001
Posted to the web June 11, 2001

Washington, DC and New York City

On the eve of President George Bush's first official trip to Europe, Africa Action today released a letter to the President signed by 65 leadership figures from across the United States calling for billions of additional dollars to fight the global AIDS pandemic. Africa Action Board President, Rev. Dr. Wyatt Tee Walker, stated that, "Increasing funding levels from all the rich countries to fight AIDS should be at the top of Bush's agenda in Europe, but in order to succeed, Washington has to commit much more itself."

The letter � whose signatories include Congresswoman Eva Clayton (D-NC); Denver Mayor Wellington Webb; Trinity United Church of Christ Pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Jr.(Chicago); Sean Barry of Advocates for Youth; and Oxfam America President Raymond C. Offenheiser � demonstrates that a broad cross section of Americans believe strongly that the United States has a moral obligation, a historical responsibility and a national interest in helping to save millions of African lives and in defeating this pandemic. It also demonstrates that significant communities around the nation believe the administration is not doing nearly enough.

The letter to President Bush reads in part: "We ask you to mandate your administration to respond with the urgency this crisis requires, by reserving at least 5 % of the anticipated budget surplus each year to fight the AIDS pandemic and to support related global health needs. At current estimates, this would provide $7.1 billion dollars for fiscal year 2002, and comparable amounts in following years."

Today's letter to President Bush is the first in a series of three weekly letters advocating changes in the current US approach to fighting the AIDS pandemic in Africa. The letters, leading up to the June 25-27 United Nations General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS, argue that: US funding must be increased; Africa's illegitimate external debts must be canceled; African nations' rights to acquire affordable
medicines for their people, including generic drugs, must be upheld; and the false dichotomy between prevention and treatment must be ended.

Salih Booker, Africa Action's Executive Director, said "The proposal to commit 5% of budget surpluses is not to suggest that funding for AIDS is optional, but to highlight the obscene imbalance where at present the wealthiest country of all time contributes so little to fight the worst plague of all time." He added that, "The existence of a surplus should simply make it easier to contribute our fair share toward a solution." The Bush administration boasts that the US already contributes over 50% of the current total international funding. Booker compared this to "contributing more than half of one cup of water to put out a forest fire!"

* The Honorable George W. Bush President of the United States The
White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20500

June 11, 2001

Dear President Bush, We are writing you with a very simple and urgent request. An unprecedented global health emergency is killing millions of people around the world. It is devastating the African continent.

The human toll of the HIV/AIDS pandemic will soon outpace that of any comparable disease in human history.

We ask you to mandate your administration to respond with the
urgency this crisis requires, by reserving at least 5% of the anticipated budget surplus each year to fight the AIDS pandemic and to support related global health needs. At current estimates, this would provide $7.1 billion dollars for fiscal year 2002, and comparable amounts in following years if present forecasts hold true.

For twenty years now the HIV/AIDS pandemic has raced ahead of the
global response. Over 50 million people have been infected.
Scientists, health workers and activists have gained much experience and know what needs to be done. Although there is yet no cure, antiretroviral drugs can now turn a certain death sentence for millions into years of productive life. The failure to prevent such deaths, when the means are available, will increasingly be seen as the equivalent of mass murder.

In the last year we have seen new levels of public attention. Africans and others have successfully challenged the complacent assumption that those too poor to pay for treatment should simply be left to die. Countries like Brazil, Uganda and Senegal show that the growth of the pandemic can be reversed.

It is long past time to scale up action from pilot projects and
business-as- usual timetables, to save lives now and stop the
pandemic's exponential growth. More African governments are taking action. The U.S. and other rich countries have pledged new resources. But even the most ambitious proposals now being considered by the U.S. government (such as Senator Frist's proposal to add $200 million in new AIDS funding in Fiscal Year 2002 and $500 million in Fiscal Year 2003, for a total of $1.2 billion by the second year) still fall far short of the minimum required.

Fighting the pandemic requires rejecting the false dichotomy between treatment and prevention. Both are necessary.

Treatment in turn requires not only drugs, but also effective
mechanisms for delivery, care and monitoring. A comprehensive
approach also requires strengthening public health systems,
combating closely related infectious diseases, and addressing the
structural injustices that fuel the pandemic by marginalizing vulnerable groups such as women, unemployed youth and the poor in general. Some may use the scale of the challenge to argue for continuing to limit the response to prevention and research only. Such an approach would only bring more death while failing to check the pandemic's spread. We will not accept such a dismissal of the value of African lives.

To maximize their capacity to respond, African countries must be
freed of the burden of foreign debt so that they can allocate more of their own resources on healthcare. Countries must also be free to exercise their full rights to obtain essential drugs at the lowest-possible cost, including the use of generic manufacturing and imports. But major increases in funding are also essential. Cost estimates vary for the different components of a full-scale response to the global health emergency.

Treatment for the estimated 2.4 million Africans infected with HIV who could benefit from antiretroviral treatment, according to one recent estimate, would cost approximately $2.7 billion a year. UNAIDS estimates at least $3 billion a year for needed prevention efforts in Africa. Add in treatment of related diseases, necessary health infrastructure development, and costs in other developing regions such as India and China where the pandemic is beginning to spread more rapidly, and the total required easily falls in the $15 billion to $20 billion a year range.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has called for a global fund of a more modest amount of $7 to $10 billion a year to support a broad developing world campaign against the AIDS pandemic.

Even the highest figure, however, is less than one penny out of each ten dollars of the gross national product of the world's rich countries. It is a small price to pay to save millions of lives. It is a also a prudent investment, because failing to pay that price will result in profound economic collapse that will ultimately require even greater expense.

Mr. President, we believe that the real question is how much inequality are we prepared to accept in the world today?

The international community is currently considering proposals for a new global fund to respond to the health emergency. Such a fund should provide resources quickly to governments, inter- governmental organizations and non- governmental organizations ready to scale up action against the HIV/AIDS pandemic and related health problems. The U.S. should support this initiative and stand ready to provide the necessary resources. A US commitment of five % of next year's US budget surplus for all global health expenses would only be about one-third of one percent of estimated government revenues, about $25 a year for each American. It is a price we should pay.

Mr. President, we call upon you to acknowledge that human lives that can be saved should be saved, regardless of skin color or location. We ask you to ensure that the U.S. pays its fair share in fighting the most deadly pandemic in human history.

Sincerely, Salih Booker - Executive Director, Africa Action

Congresswoman Eva Clayton (D-NC)

Religious Action Network (RAN): Rev. Dr. Wyatt Tee Walker - Canaan Baptist Church, New York, NY(RAN Co- Founder and President of the Board of Directors, Africa Action)

Rev. Dr. Charles G. Adams - Hartford Memorial Baptist Church,
Detroit, MI Rev. Dr. Christopher Allen Bullock - Progressive Baptist Church, Chicago, IL Rev. Dr. James A. Forbes, Jr. - Riverside Church, New York, NY Rev. Jesse Jackson - Rainbow/PUSH Coalition Rev. Samuel B. Kyles - Monumental Baptist Church, Memphis, TN Rev. William Lawson - Wheeler Ave. Baptist Rev. Samuel Mann - St. Mark's Church, Kansas City, MO Bennie Mitchell - US Labor Relations Department, National Baptist Convention, GA Dr. Otis Moss - Mt. Olivet Baptist Church, Cleveland, OH Bishop Norman Quick - Childs Memorial Temple, New York, NY Rev. Dr. Franklyn Richardson - Grace Baptist Church, Mt. Vernon, NY Rev. Morris Shearin - Israel Baptist Church Rev. Dr. J. Alfred Smith, Sr. - Allen Temple Baptist Church Dr. Emil Thomas - Zion Baptist Church, Washington, DC Rev. Lonnie Turner -
Cooperative Baptist Fellowship Canon Frederick B. Williams -
Intercession Episcopal Church, New York, NY (RAN Co- Founder)
Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Jr. - Trinity United Church of Christ, Chicago, IL Rev. Johnny Youngblood - St. Paul Community Baptist Church

State and Local Legislators Network:

Arthur M. Cole - National Conference of Black Mayors Inc.

Carl Galmon - President, Louisiana Committee Against Apartheid
Avel Louise Gordly - State Senator, Oregon Legislative Assembly
Assemblyman William Payne - NJ State Assembly Councilman Bill
Perkins - New York City Council Beryl Roberts - Attorney and former State Representative, Miami, FL Councilmember Annette Robinson - The Council of the City of New York, Brooklyn, NY Jack C. Sims - President, Mayland Black Mayors, Inc.

Leroy O. Smith - Denver, CO Mayor Woodrow Stanley - Flint, MI
Assemblyman Albert Vann - NY State Assembly Mayor Wellington
Webb - Denver, CO

Youth Action Network:

Sean Barry - International Youth Leadership Council, Advocates for Youth, Washington, DC Kelli Curry - Americans Mobilizing Against the Spread of AIDS in Africa, New York, NY Jennifer Kloes - Executive Director, Global Youth Connect, New York, NY Keleigh Matthews - Director of Programs, Metro TeenAIDS, Washington, DC Obumneme Egwuatu - Attorney, New York, NY Johnnie Stevens - International Action Center/People Video Network, New York, NY Neil Watkins - Center for Economic Justice

Advocacy Network for Africa (ADNA):

Rob Cavenaugh - Legislative Director, Unitarian Universalist
Association of Congregations Larry Daressa - Co-Director, California Newsreel, San Francisco, CA Julie Davids - Director, Critical Path AIDS Project Peter J. Davies - US Representative, Saferworld Rev. Paul Dirdak - Deputy General Secretary of Health and Welfare - General Board of Global Ministries, United Methodist Church Rev. Seamus P. Finn - Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate

Marcelina Gaoses - Albany, CA William Goodfellow - Executive
Director, Center for International Policy, Washington, DC Mark
Harrington - Senior Policy Director, Treatment Action Group, New
York, NY Clara Lou Humphrey - Colorado Nuhad Jamal - Executive
Director, Eritrean Development Foundation, MD Susie Johnson -
Executive Secretary for Public Policy, United Methodist Women
(Washington office) Kirimi Kaberia - President/CEO, ACTnet, VA
Heeten Kalan - Director, South African Exchange Program on
Environmental Justice Wanjiru Kamau - African Immigrant Foundation, Washington, DC Sheila Kibuka - Executive Director - Hope Africa, Nairobi, Kenya Valerie Papaya Mann - Executive Director, Comprehensive AIDS Resource Education Consortium, Washington, DC David Mozer - Washington State Africa Network Ms. Mistera Mulugeta - Founder/Executive Director, Axum Institute, MD Raymond C. Offenheiser - President, Oxfam America Fr. Phil Reed - Society of Missionaries of Africa Asia Russell - Coordinator, International Policy, Health GAP Coalition, New York, NY Ned W. Stowe - Legislative Secretary, Friends Committee on National Legislation (Quakers) Lynda Tidemann - Program Director, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Robert Weissman - Co-Director, Essential Action, Washington, DC Phyllis S. Yingling - Chair, US Section, Women's International League for Peace & Freedom

Copyright � 2001 AfricaAction.
Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media
(allAfrica.com).