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Email: "Bush Doubles AIDS Relief Funding While Congress Introduces Bill to Cut Modest Abstinence Requirement"

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Second issue is fact that $30 billion program will be managed by active and "open" homosexual Mark Dybul BY LifeSiteNews.com By John and Steve Jalsevac WASHINGTON, D.C., June 6, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – On May 30th President Bush announced his plan to double the funding to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). The original commitment made by the President in 2003 was $15 billion, making the sum of the new funding $30 billion. If Congress approves the President’s funding, then in total the United States Government will have spent $48.3 billion on fighting AIDS over the space of ten years.“Once again, the generosity of the American people is one of the great untold stories of our time,” Bush said in announcing the proposed funding increase. “Our citizens are offering comfort to millions who suffer and restoring hope to those who feel forsaken.”Even prior to the announced doubling of PEPFAR funding the AIDS relief plan was the largest commitment ever by any nation for an international health initiative dedicated to a single disease. PEPFAR has made available antiretroviral drugs to literally hundreds of thousands of AIDS sufferers since its inception, and has helped prevent AIDS infection in countless others.At the same time as Bush has announced the unprecedented increase in funding for PEPFAR however, a number of senators, led by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) have introduced a bill that, if passed, would strike down a PEPFAR requirement that says that a certain amount of the program’s funds must be spent on abstinence education and promotion. In the past PEPFAR has been a source of controversy, largely on account of the abstinence funding requirement, which says that 33% of all AIDS prevention funds must be used on abstinence programs. However, since AIDS prevention is only a portion of what PEPFAR funding is used for, monies dedicated to abstinence programs amount to only approximately 7% of the total PEPFAR funding. Nevertheless, since the initiation of the program in 2003 pro-abortion/contraception/family-planning organizations have repeatedly accused the Bush administration of ideological bias and of hindering the fight against AIDS by requiring that money be spent on what they believe are ineffective abstinence programs. Instead these groups call for the widespread provision of condoms as the most effective means of prevention. Pro-life/pro-family advocates, on the other hand, point towards the consistent success that abstinence education has had in lowering the infection rates, and point out the serious dangers of pushing condom use as a primary means of fighting AIDS, given the failure rate of condoms. In 2003 the United Nations AIDS agency (UNAIDS) admitted that condoms have a significantly high failure rate in protecting wearers from the transmission of AIDS.In Uganda, on the other hand, where abstinence was stressed as the primary means of AIDS prevention and the use of a condom as a last alternative, AIDS rates fell dramatically. Pro-family advocates are wondering why the very small abstinence requirement is being contested when it has obviously helped save so many lives.Austin Ruse, the President of C-FAM, a non-profit, non-partisan research and educational institute focusing on international social policy, pointed out the hypocrisy of groups who are so virulently opposed to even a modest push for abstinence as an effective weapon against the spread of AIDS. Ruse told LifeSiteNews, “The amount of money that we’re talking about for abstinence education compared to the whole amount of money that we’re spending is miniscule. It just shows you the very radical nature of our opponents on these issues. Abstinence education has been shown to be effective in at least delaying sexual activity in young people. It’s certainly not a silver bullet. It’s not guaranteed that people will wait until they’re married, but it certainly does slow things down. The other side is just so ideological on these questions. They are certainly anti-choice when it comes to things like it.”“We know that this congress is going to be continuously attempting to strike out whatever modest gains we made on social policy over the last several years,” said Ruse, regarding the bill attempting to strike the abstinence requirements from PEPFAR. “And the gains really have been modest. And so they’re taking every single opportunity to roll back every single good program that our side has managed to get through Congress over the last several years. This will not stop. This will continue through the rest of the Bush administration and then certainly beyond.”  A serious concern about the Bush initiated AIDS program is that the United States’ Global AIDS Coordinator, with the role of leading the implementation of President Bush’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, is Mark Dybul, an active and “open” homosexual. Dybul was sworn in by Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice October 10, while his homosexual “partner”, Jason Claire, held the Bible. Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council, said at the time of Dybul’s swearing in last October, “We have to face the fact that putting a homosexual in charge of AIDS policy is a bit like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse,”See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage: United Nations Report says Condoms Fail to Protect against AIDS 10% of the Timehttp://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2003/jun/03062303.htmlUganda’s First Lady Warns Teens against Condom Usehttp://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/jan/04011205.htmlUnited Nations Official Slams US for Abstinence Approach to AIDS in Ugandahttp://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/aug/05083101.htmlU.N.‘s Top AIDS Envoy Forgets Diplomacy in Demonizing U.S. Abstinence First Strategyhttp://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/jul/04071602.htmlUganda AIDS Prevention Success Being Undermined by Infuriated UN Condom-Pushershttp://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/feb/05020408.htmlBush Appointment of Gay Man to Head US AIDS Program Dismays Social Conservatives  http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/oct/06101603.html http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/bush-doubles-aids-relief-funding-while-congress-introduces-bill-to-cut-mode/

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