Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report Summarizes Editorials on Bush's AIDS Policy

Several newspapers this week have published editorials and opinion pieces on President Bush's domestic and international AIDS policies. Summaries of the editorials appear below:

• Julie Gerberding, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Encouraging people to undergo HIV testing is both a "clinical imperative" and a "public health necessity," CDC Director Julie Gerberding writes in a Journal-Constitution guest editorial. Bush and HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson's call for increased testing is a "critical" move in the fight against AIDS, Gerberding says (Gerberding, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 7/6).

• Boston Globe: Bush's HIV/AIDS policy in developing countries should go "[b]eyond the ABCs of AIDS prevention" to include more information about sexually transmitted diseases and effective prevention measures, a Globe editorial says. In addition, prevention programs should include programs supporting reproductive and general health and economic development -- especially for women -- the Globe says (Boston Globe, 7/6).
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• New York Times: By withholding the $34 million appropriated by Congress to the United Nations Population Fund based on the "false accusation" that it supports coerced abortions in China, the Bush administration is endangering programs that "advance poor women's reproductive health, reduce infant mortality ... and prevent the spread of HIV," a Times editorial says. Bush's policy is an "attack" on comprehensive family planning and on women's "sexual and reproductive autonomy" worldwide, the editorial concludes (New York Times, 7/5).

• Washington Times: The global AIDS epidemic has become not only a "humanitarian concern" but a "security threat," a Times editorial says. Bush last week said that HIV helps create "conditions in which terrorism can survive," according to the Times. The editorial concludes that the Bush administration should increase its financial commitments to HIV/AIDS initiatives -- including the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Washington Times, 7/6).

Back to other news for July 6, 2004