Black AIDS Institute Responds to Ryan White CARE Act Reauthorization

Yesterday, the Black AIDS Institute issued a press statement in response to the recent reauthorization of the Ryan White CARE Act. Here are some excerpts from the statement.

There are now more Americans living with HIV/ AIDS than ever before, half of them African American.

But as need has grown in all regions of the country, funding has lagged everywhere as well. Since 2001, the Ryan White CARE Act budget has grown by 14 percent, to just under $2.1 billion in fiscal year 2006. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention meanwhile estimates 200,000 Americans have become newly infected in that time period – a 25 percent jump – bringing the total number infected to more than a million.

Of those who are in treatment, 30 percent are paying for it through the CARE Act’s AIDS Drug Assistance Program. Waiting lists for ADAP appear in states around the country every year, and South Carolina recently announced that four people have died this year while languishing on its hundreds- deep waiting list. Sixty percent of ADAP clients are Black; 59 percent of CARE Act clients overall are racial minorities.
In February, the Institute will release a report detailing these treatment policy challenges and examining how they have affected Black America. The report, which is the latest in a series on the state of AIDS in Black America, presents the experiences of Black doctors, patients and patient advocates -- and it offers their ideas on closing an ongoing racial death gap in America’s epidemic.

The reauthorization deal – brokered by Sens. Edward Kennedy (D.-Mass.) and Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) – punts the ball on dealing with these difficult questions. It reauthorizes the CARE Act for just three years, rather than five, and assures s tates with older epidemics they won’t lose more than 5% of their current funding. Over the next three years, Congress must sit down and hammer out a new program altogether – a process observers say Kennedy’s office is dedicated to starting immediately in the new Congress next year.

Ultimately, however, no amount of reform will impact the trajectory of this epidemic if Congress doesn’t take the most crucial step: fully funding the CARE Act, along with other prevention and treatment programs, and finally developing a national plan to end the AIDS epidemic in America. The U.S., as a donor nation, demands that developing countries have a national AIDS plan. Yet, we don’t have one of our own, and no one is developing one. As the axiom goes, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” With 40,000 new infections a year for the last 10 years, between 25% and 50% of people living with HIV undiagnosed, and only about 30% of people with HIV in appropriate care, we're failing. Washington must develop a plan that stops new infections and assures that no American will go without life- saving AIDS treatment and care, period. Everything else follows from there.

The President signed the reauthorization bill into law today (Tuesday December 19th). The White House issued a fact sheet on the legislation:

The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Modernization Act Revises And Extends Services Under The Ryan White Care Act (RWCA) Program. This Act will:

• Provide More Flexibility To Direct Funding To Areas Of Greatest Need. New supplemental grants will be provided to States with an increasing need for HIV/AIDS-related services due to limited access to health care, high prevalence of HIV/AIDS, and other relevant factors. The program's formula for awarding funds will also be updated to consider the number of HIV and AIDS cases – the previous formula considered only the number of AIDS cases.
• Target Money To Core Life-Saving Medical Services For Those In Need. Grantees under Titles I, II, and III of the program will use no less than 75 percent of funds to provide core medical services. In addition, the reauthorization calls for the Early Intervention Services grant program to provide core medical services for individuals with HIV/AIDS in underserved populations.
• Require More Aggressive Oversight Of RWCA Programs. For example, the Secretary of Health and Human Services will be required to submit biennial reports describing barriers to HIV program integration. In addition, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) will be required to conduct an evaluation concerning how funds are used to provide family-centered care involving outpatient or ambulatory care services under Title IV of the RWCA Program.
• Standardize Minimum Requirements For The AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP). The Secretary of Health and Human Services will develop and maintain a list of core ADAP medications needed to manage symptoms associated with HIV infection. States will be required to ensure that their programs, at a minimum, provide these core medications.

The nationa's largest (and most useless) LGBT organization, the Human Rights Campaign issued a statement in response on the bill signing, also. Strangely, the Task Force did not issue a statement.