Around 100 activists blocked a White House intersection to protest Trump’s cuts to HIV-prevention programs. This powerful demonstration was done on World AIDS day, a global movement to fight against HIV/AIDS while showing strength and solidarity towards those we’ve lost.
Because of the current administration, this was the first year since 1988 that World AIDS day has not been commemorated by the U.S. government.
According to LGBTQ Nation, the protesters rolled out giant red banners covered in writing, naming the African countries that were denied HIV funding by the Trump administration. This made a powerful, loud statement about the lives that are actively at risk due to the funding cuts.
Asia Russell, the Health GAP’s Executive Director, spoke to The Washington Blade, stating, “Trump thinks by banning commemoration of World AIDS Day, he can hide from the death and destruction that he’s causing around the world.
“But we’re here to say, we can see him,” Russell adds. “We see him stealing medicine, stealing support services, stealing HIV testing, stealing life-saving care from communities all around the world suffering and dying without access.”
Protestors specifically called out the director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought for defying the appropriations authority of Congress by axing funding towards the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). This is an HIV-prevention program that, since it was created in 2003, has saved around 25-26 million people’s lives.
Overall, Vought voided around $4.9 billion in HIV/AIDS prevention and other foreign aid health programs.
The demonstrators’ press release wrote, “As a result, lifesaving treatment and prevention programs have closed across dozens of sub-Saharan African countries, while Vought has refused to release money ringfenced by Congress to save lives.”
An estimates 127,073 adults and 12,527 infants have died from HIV/AIDS due to these cuts.
Even here in the U.S., life-saving HIV/AIDS treatment is becoming less accessible. Recently, CVS Health, the largest pharmacy benefit manager in the U.S. announced they will not cover Gilead Sciences’ Yeztugo (Lenacapavir), a groundbreaking HIV-prevention medication.
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