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Groups poised for lobbying battle on AIDS measure |
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By Ilan Wurman
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Posted: 06/02/07 08:53 AM [ET] |
Liberal and conservative groups are poised for a lobbying battle on legislation that would increase U.S. funding for combating AIDS.
President Bush called on Congress Wednesday to increase the funding for the global initiative to $30 billion over the next five years.
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos (D-Calif.) hailed the president’s announcement, but indicated that the administration’s plan would be closely scrutinized.
“As the Foreign Affairs Committee moves to reauthorize this critical program, we will closely examine the requirement that at least 33 percent of total funding for prevention initiatives be used for abstinence-until-marriage education,” Lantos said. “The Institute of Medicine and the Government Accountability Office have reported that this requirement has been a hindrance to the effectiveness of prevention efforts across the board."
Global AIDS Alliance agrees with Lantos’ assessment. The abstinence provision “is a requirement that’s not working,” said David Bryden, communications director for the liberal-leaning group. “The biggest problem here is that HIV is spreading rapidly among young people, including teenagers. And that’s not something we can put our head in the sand about and hope that somehow these kids are going to become abstinent. It’s not realistic.”
The abstinence provisions of the bill, however, were critical to gain support from conservative groups when the GOP-led Congress passed an AIDS authorization bill in 2003.
The Family Research Council (FRC) and Concerned Women for America (CWA) will lobby to keep the provisions.
“We’re definitely going to be lobbying very hard both Congress and President Bush who has supported these provisions to keep them in,” said Tom McClusky, vice president of government affairs at the FRC. “It’s not even a large part of the overall spending, but some in Congress are upset and want to try to remove that. I’m sorry, but I think that condemns hundreds of thousands of people to death.”
CWA believes that removing the provisions would have major ramifications.
“If Title V is not reauthorized before the June 30 deadline, we will not only lose funding for abstinence programs, but just as importantly, the definitions and guidelines that govern all of the federal abstinence
dollars,” said Shari Rendall, CWA’s director of legislation and public policy.
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