Implementer of Anti-Prostitution Pledge Caught in Call Girl Scandal

CONTACT:

Juhu Thukral, Urban Justice Center, (646) 602-5690 Jodi Jacobson, Center for Health and Gender Equity, (301) 257-7897

WASHINGTON, April 30, 2007 - Randall Tobias, the Bush administration's so-called "AIDS czar," resigned abruptly Friday after his name surfaced in a Washington, D.C. sex scandal. Tobias, Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator, oversaw global AIDS funding. Tobias was responsible for enforcing a widely criticized U.S. policy that forced groups to sign a pledge denouncing prostitution and sex trafficking and vowing to work against them in order to receive U.S. HIV/AIDS prevention funding.

“Public officials such as Tobias have a crucial responsibility to advance public health and human rights, not ideology, especially in facing public health crises of unprecedented proportions, such as the global AIDS epidemic,” stated Jodi Jacobson, Executive Director of the Center for Health and Gender Equity.

Tobias, 65, who is married, held the firm belief that the way to stop the AIDS pandemic was to emphasize faithfulness and abstinence over condom use as underscored by his testimony in several Congressional hearings. Activists criticized his appointment to oversee all U.S. foreign assistance programs as endangering efforts to control the spread of HIV/AIDS worldwide, especially among women.

“During his past tenure as Global AIDS coordinator and in his current capacity, Tobias vigorously defended and enforced Administration policies, ranging from the abstinence-until-marriage earmark in global AIDS policy-- which has been criticized by both the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the Institute of Medicine (IOM)—and the prostitution pledge, both of which contradict public health evidence and undermine basic human rights. That Tobias himself would be found in violation of both policies would be amusing if the effects of these policies on the lives of real people at risk of infection, stigma and discrimination in Africa, Asia, and Latin America were not so deadly,” said Jacobson.

Juhu Thukral, Director, Sex Workers Project at the Urban Justice Center said, “These policies championed by Tobias for the Bush Administration run contrary to best practices in public health and are undermining efforts to stem the spread of HIV and human trafficking. The restrictions preclude recipients of U.S. funds from using proven effective practices to prevent the spread of HIV among marginalized populations, and undermine efforts to promote the fundamental human rights of all persons.”

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