PEPFAR, you jerk! We know Condoms Work!

The President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) has finally been reauthorized for another five years, and it’s time to hold the United States accountable for its work.  It’s pretty clear that, under PEPFAR, the rights of women and young people are ignored.  The many strings attached to its plan undermine the needs of women and young people and their ability to have ownership over their own reproductive and sexual health. 

One of the most harmful pieces within PEPFAR II is the requirement that the State Department report to Congress any time a country with a generalized epidemic expends less than 50 percent of its funds to prevent sexual transmission of HIV on abstinence, delay of sexual debut, monogamy, fidelity, or partner reduction.  Evidence from best practices indicates that a comprehensive prevention strategy that also includes education about condoms and harm reduction are critical to achieving a substantial reduction in new infections. 

Another troubling aspect of PEPFAR is the prostitution loyalty oath that must be signed by any organizations receiving funding from the U.S. government---including those working with highly vulnerable and marginalized populations. If the Bush Administration is setting out to address the needs of women and young people worldwide, restricting our access to contraceptives and excluding sex workers from prevention programs is absolutely counterproductive and violates our sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Well, I can say now that we, youth activists, couldn’t have made our objections to PEPFAR any more clear this week.  Young people from all over the world held a rally and marched from the Media Pavilion to the “U.S. Response to Global AIDS” booth chanting slogans and holding signs like, “PEPFAR, you jerk! We know Condoms Work!” and “Sex Education is the Name of the Game! Abstinence-Only—Shame! Shame! Shame!” Many of the young activists were tied with strings to symbolize the strings attached to PEPFAR such as policies like the reporting requirement of funds for sexual transmission prevention and the prostitution loyalty oath. 

Once we arrived at the PEFPAR booth, the youth activists stood there with signs, chanting away, and concluded with a speech from Caiti Schroering, a member of the Student Global AIDS Campaign.  Caiti spoke about the 50 percent reporting requirement.  Obviously, the Bush Administration hasn’t learned that young people NEED comprehensive, science-based sex education that addresses the realities of our everyday lives.  We made it clear today and we’ll continue to speak out until it’s written and implemented in our policies!

What I love about these international forums, like the International AIDS Conference (IAC), is that they provide us with the opportunity to address key issues with our stakeholders. Whether it’s the Minister of Health of Mexico, the CEO of Bristol-Meyers, or the U.S. Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator (OGAC), they are all in attendance and readily available. If they aren’t listening, which is normally the case, then there’s always the media to channel the message out to their constituents all around the world. 

All in all, I can commend Advocates for Youth and our fellow partners for the well-organized, albeit, sometimes last-minute, actions and bird-dogging that took place throughout the week.   Policymakers should know that they are not doing us, activists, a favor by just “showing up” at the conference.  We expect them to address the challenges of the pandemic and, most importantly, take action to responsibly and scientifically focus on the needs of marginalized populations of the HIV/AIDS pandemic—including young people, particularly young women and girls, men who have sex with men, intravenous drug users, sex workers, and people living with HIV and AIDS. 

As with PEPFAR, OGAC needs to realize that we are not just going to allow them to waste billions of dollars by continuing to fund and implement abstinence-only and be-faithful programs.   Everyone has the right to ALL science-based education and tools that can prevent them from acquiring preventable diseases—it is unacceptable that PEPFAR ignores the realities of everyday people who have to make their own individual, unique decisions about their reproductive and sexual health.