What About AIDS?

". . . In the United States, the [CDC] estimates that 40,000 people will become infected with HIV this year. Yet, President Bush, in pointing out the 'unprecedented dangers' faced by the nation in his State of the Union address, somehow fails to mention HIV/AIDS.

". . . It is a tragedy of these times that the president's superb leadership in the fight against terrorism is not mirrored in his response to HIV/AIDS.

". . . Financial neglect is compounded by policy gaffes. For instance, one of Bush's first executive orders re-imposed the Mexico City Policy [preventing] the federal government from funding overseas family planning efforts. . . . Many family planning clinics diagnose and treat [STDs]. Co-infection with STDs makes persons infected with HIV more infectious and uninfected persons more susceptible to HIV infection.

". . . Last year, budget shortfalls caused 17 states to restrict access to the AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP), which pays for [HIV medications]. With state budgets constrained by the slowing economy and the president calling on Congress to 'restrain the federal budget,' this state of affairs can only worsen.

"Hopes that Bush might base his HIV/AIDS policy on science were dashed by [the] announcement that Tom Coburn . . . will co-chair the president's Advisory Council on HIV and AIDS. Coburn is noted for his advocacy of abstinence-only HIV prevention programs. This stance is contradicted by the surgeon general's report last year demonstrating that abstinence-only programs are ineffective.

"Coburn couples this position with opposition to the use of condoms, which have proven effective in reducing HIV transmission [and to] to needle exchanges, another effective prevention technique.

". . . In these strange times, the ultimate irony may be that while Bush is winning the war against terrorism spawned by religious fundamentalism, he is losing the war against HIV/AIDS by turning the conduct of it over to religious fundamentalists."

Thomas Coates, Ph.D., is professor of Medicine and Director of AIDS Research Institute at the University of California, San Francisco. Stephen Morin, PhD, is an associate professor of Medicine and Director of the AIDS Policy Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco. Jeff Sheehy is deputy director of communications for the AIDS Research Unit at the University of California, San Francisco.

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