US House of Representatives trumps Administration on Global AIDS budgets

The US House of Representatives has budgeted $193 million more to global AIDS programs in the 2013 Foreign Operations & Appropriations Bill than President Barack Obama proposed. Despite a 5%, or $2 billion, reduction in overall foreign operations spending from the fiscal year 2012 Appropriations Bill, the House budget would maintain current levels of funding. This is in stark contrast to the Administration’s unprecedented request for a reduction in global AIDS funding, commented the USA-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), which lauded the move.

“AHF would like to thank Representative Kay Granger (Republican, Texas) for her continuing leadership on this issue, and Rep Nita Lowey (Democrat, New York) for showing that a strong response to the global AIDS epidemic has strong bipartisan support. In this House bill, funding for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief remains at its 2012 level, while under President Obama’s proposed budget, funding and total expenditures for PEPFAR would be reduced, meaning fewer people on treatment and fewer lives saved,” said Tom Myers, AHF’s chief of public affairs, noting that Rep Granger is the Chair of the House Appropriations Committee’s Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs, and Rep Lowey is the ranking Member of the Subcommittee.

“The Subcommittee understands that we cannot achieve the goal of an ‘AIDS-free generation’ by cutting global AIDS funding. We are grateful to those legislators working to maintain a priority on AIDS care and treatment programs like PEPFAR, particularly after numerous studies have shown that treatment is the key to controlling the epidemic. And for Congress to do so at a time when the overall Foreign Appropriations budget was cut by over two billion dollars demonstrates an even more impressive commitment to fighting AIDS,” said Mr Myers