Prevention
HIV prevention is the cornerstone of the fight against HIV/AIDS. In absence of an effective vaccine or microbicide, and in light of limited access to HIV treatment for those infected, the scaling up of proven effective HIV prevention strategies is critical to the public health effort of controlling the epidemic, both domestically and globally.
The only way to slow the spread of the domestic HIV/AIDS epidemic available includes educational outreach, harm reducing interventions, and strong supportive services.
Evidence-based HIV prevention strategies also provide other health benefits, such as prevention of sexually transmitted infections, unwanted pregnancy, and protection against Hepatitis B and C transmission. These programs need to be deployed in a manner that will allow them to reach those populations most at risk, especially African American women, gay men and men who have sex with (particularly African Americans), young people, and injection drug users.
We know how to stop HIV: over two decades of research efforts have yielded solid evidence on what types of prevention strategies and interventions are effective in preventing viral transmission. However, the Federal government continues to ignore these data through the passage of policies that are based on ideology rather than scientific evidence, and that continue to stigmatize and marginalize those most in need of effective HIV prevention tools.
Individuals and communities across the country would benefit from adequately funded, comprehensive, culturally competent, accessible, science-based prevention interventions.
Unfortunately, federal HIV prevention funding has not been increased in ten years, and during this time the annual rate of new HIV infections has remained steady at approximately 40,000 per year. It may be that our nation's annual rate of HIV infection is actually higher than that estimate. Without more resources driven to HIV prevention, this number will not decrease.
Recent research argues that if we had not invested as we have done, we could have likely experienced an additional 1.5 million infections in the United States and that by averting new infections and the related costs of treatment, prevention saved taxpayers $11 billion.
Unfortunately, we have hit a plateau in the prevention of this disease and the number of new infections has remained stagnant rather than continuing to decrease. A different reality might be at hand if HIV prevention is given the necessary political support and adequate funding for evidence-based interventions. We know how to stop HIV and it is clear that more investment will lead to a reduction in the number of infections.
The next President of the United States must get serious about ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic, both at home and abroad. In order to do that, he or she must have a solid commitment to HIV prevention, and to revising America's policies so that HIV prevention can be scaled up to levels where they can have a true impact on the epidemic. We must prioritize prevention to address the enormous needs in our most vulnerable populations.
The AIDSVote prevention platform outlines a clear path to change our course:
- Increase funds for HOPWA HIV/AIDS housing programs and care coordination and support initiatives; build support at all levels of government for strong and consistently accessible AIDS housing efforts.
- Eliminate funding for ineffective abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, while creating a dedicated funding stream for comprehensive sex education by supporting the REAL Act.
- End the ban on federal syringe exchange funding.
- Reduce new HIV infections by investing at least $1 billion a year for science-based HIV prevention strategies through the CDC; ensure all HIV testing initiatives include a link to guaranteed HIV treatment and prevention services.
