THE GLOBAL GAG RULE AND BUSH'S HIV/AIDS INITIATIVE:
PUTTING POLITICS BEFORE PUBLIC HEALTH
Statement by the International Women's Health Coalition

It is unconscionable for the Bush administration to politicize health issues at the expense of poor women around the world. As in the past, the Administration has bowed to the winds of an extreme anti-health, anti-science, and anti-woman minority, even as the world is coming together in a concerted effort to fight HIV/AIDS.

The Administration has a clear track record in this regard. It has blocked funding for UNFPA, an agency that works on HIV prevention and its social underpinnings. It has attempted to block international consensus on the use of condoms to prevent HIV/AIDS at numerous UN conferences. And now, it appears to be doing whatever it can to ensure that comprehensive reproductive health services will not be available to those who most need them.

The proportion of those living with HIV/AIDS who are women is on the rise-globally, it jumped from 41 percent in 1997 to 47 percent in 2000-and it is now widely recognized that pervasive gender inequalities fuel the epidemic's spread in every region of the world. In sub-Saharan Africa, where the majority of Bush's "Emergency AIDS Initiative" funds will be directed, 58 percent of those infected with HIV are women. Young women in sub-Saharan Africa experience HIV prevalence rates two to three times higher than their young male counterparts, partly because they are biologically more vulnerable, but mainly because they are at a distinct social disadvantage.

"Young women receive very little information about their sexuality, are frequently subjected to sexual violence, and are powerless to control when and with whom they have sexual relations," says Adrienne Germain, President of the International Women's Health Coalition. "The Administration's determination to eliminate comprehensive sexuality education programs, impose an abstinence-only until marriage policy, defund UNFPA, and deny funds to organizations that deliver the full range of health services that girls and women need will exacerbate-not curb-the spread of HIV/AIDS."

The Global Gag Rule currently in place denies money to organizations already well positioned to provide women with the services they require. In many of the countries slated to receive money in Bush's "Emergency AIDS Initiative," public health systems are extremely weak. If HIV NGOs are subjected to the gag rule, then women will truly have nowhere to turn. Allowing U.S. domestic politics to dictate what health services women are allowed to have is an unconscionable substitution of ideology for sound public health policy.

For more information, contact Ellen Sweet, Vice President, Public Affairs at esweet@iwhc.org or 212-979-8500.