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November 17, 2003,
9:12 a.m.
Doing Africa Right
Congress conferences on AIDS aid.
Six months ago, when Congress passed President Bush's historic $15 billion, five-year HIV/AIDS-relief plan for sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean with overwhelming bipartisan support, lawmakers sent a strong signal to the international community that the United States is committed to leading the world in fighting the deadly disease.
But now, as the appropriations process comes to a close, the question of funding the president's initiative at the Senate-authorized level of $2.4 billion for next year still remains unresolved as House and Senate members meet in conference. Appropriating anything less than that amount would undermine the White House's effort and compromise the ability of those acting boldly and successfully to fight the spread of the HIV virus throughout the world.
The Senate passed a bipartisan amendment last week adding $289 million to America's international AIDS funding in 2004 — an increase that would bring total U.S. funding for AIDS to $2.4 billion for the next year.
The president's plan — modeled on Uganda's highly successful abstinence-based program — aggressively targets the 14 nations that contain more than half of the world's HIV/AIDS cases by making both new investments and by leveraging community-based and faith-based organizations to insure that treatment and prevention resources go directly to the victims. In a region where HIV/AIDS has left eleven million children orphaned and lowered the average life expectancy to 47 years, the president's plan will prevent seven million new HIV infections, treat two million HIV-infected people, and provide care for ten million HIV-infected adults and orphans. Immune systems weakened by HIV/AIDS encourage the spread of tuberculosis and malaria, making those diseases difficult to contain. Slowing the spread of HIV/AIDS will also help to prevent and control their crippling effects.
Death due to AIDS in Africa is preventable, but only if numerous steps are taken to slow the spread of this devastating and debilitating disease — and only if Congress honors its responsibility to fund the commitment it has agreed to.
The Global AIDS bill provides money for these steps, including: an emergency-response plan for organizations already on the ground and working in Africa and the Caribbean; a mother-to-child transmission prevention program; HIV/AIDS programs administered through the Department of Health and Human Services; and a commitment to the international Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
We have the ability to better the lives of millions of people in the war against HIV/AIDS, and to bring hope to many who have none. We encourage our congressional colleagues in conference to embrace this historic opportunity by following the president's leadership and appropriating $2.4 billion — consistent with the authorization bill we passed as promised this summer. It is our responsibility to do the right thing.
Rick Santorum is a senator from Pennsylvania and chairman of the Senate Republican Conference. Mike DeWine is a Republican senator from Ohio.
