New on PEPFAR Watch

Government Accountability Office (GAO) Releases Two New Reports
On April 29, the U.S. Government Accountability Office released two new reports that examine PEPFAR and funding decisions.  

• "A More Country-Based Approach Could Improve Allocation of PEPFAR Funding"
• "Survey of PEPFAR Country Team Officials"

House Passes PEPFAR Reauthorization Bill
On April 2, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 5501, the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008.

• Bill text
• Find out how your member of Congress voted
• "Did Congress Forget About Women and Girls?" Jamila Taylor, Center for Health and Gender Equity, on a blog featured by RH Reality Check, 04/02/2008.

Concession on Global AIDS Bill Compromises Women's Health and Rights
On March 13, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has passed its own version of a bill to reauthorize the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).  The Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE) responded to the news by stating, "We hear all sorts of praise for the bipartisan compromise over PEPFAR, but how can we praise a bill that sidelines sound science and the health and rights of women?" 

CHANGE Press Release
Text of Senate bill, S. 2731
More on PEPFAR Reauthorization

Local Indiana Organizations Urge Senator Lugar to Withdraw Support for Ideologically-Driven Funding Restrictions in Reauthorization of PEPFAR 
On Tuesday, March 11, local HIV/AIDS, women's, faith-based, and student-led organizations and community leaders from Indiana called on Senator Richard Lugar to support comprehensive and integrated global HIV prevention programs and rescind any abstinence and be faithful spending set-aside in the reauthorization of the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.

• Press Release
• Sign-on letter to Senator Lugar 

 U.S. Congress Introduces New PEPFAR Bill: Two Steps Forward, Three Steps Back
On Wednesday, February 27, 2007 the House Committee on Foreign Affairs passed a bill to reauthorize the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. The Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE) praises the bill for removal of the abstinence-until-marriage earmark and, for the first time, recognizing the importance of female condoms in HIV prevention. At the same time, the bill retains the anti-prostitution pledge, and the remaining language around funding for abstinence and fidelity programs to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV is "dangerously ambiguous." The bill also seeks to restrict support for linkages between HIV/AIDS and family planning to organizations in compliance with the U.S. Global Gag Rule. Executive director of CHANGE, Serra Sippel, stated, "we are frustrated that political compromise has diluted attempts to fully support comprehensive approaches to HIV prevention and integrate HIV and family planning programs, which could save lives.”

• Center for Health and Gender Equity Press Release
  
  

Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator Releases Fourth Annual Report to Congress
Entitled The Power of Partnerships: The U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, 2008 Annual Report to Congress, the report outlines the accomplishments of PEPFAR over the last year and since the program's inception. 

• Executive Summary
  
• Full Report
  
• More reports on PEPFAR
  
  

PATHWAY Act Introduced in the Senate
Will Congress Make Global HIV/AIDS Programs Work for Women?
On Wednesday, December 5, 2007, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton introduced S. 2415--a Senate version of the Protection Against Transmission of HIV for Women and Youth (PATHWAY Act).   

• Bill text for Senate PATHWAY (S. 2415)
• Joint press release issued by the International Women's Health Coalition and the Center for Health and Gender Equity  
• Press release from Senator Clinton's office