National Minority AIDS Council Building Healthier Communities

In 2007, NMAC, formed of the National Minority Policy Partnership on HIV/AIDS (NMAPP) to bring together some of the country's largest and most powerful minority organizations to speak with a united voice on the epidemic. Click here to read the press release on this historic partnership.

In addition to NMAC, members of the new National Minority Policy Partnership on HIV/AIDS include the ACLU; Asian American Justice Center; Asian/Pacific Islander Health Forum; Indigenous Peoples Task Force; League of United Latin American Citizens; NAACP; National Congress of American Indians; National Council of La Raza; National Urban League; Rainbow/PUSH; and the United Church of Christ.

The National Minority HIV/AIDS Policy Partnership will significantly increase the impact of community of color voices in the national debate about and response to HIV by uniting some of the most powerful organizations and most respected voices in the country to share information, develop joint position statements, train constituents and coordinate public advocacy. The Partnership will work to promote full funding of programs to mitigate the impact of HIV and reduce HIV infection in communities of color, as well as social justice policies and programs to reduce the vulnerability of communities of color to HIV infection.

The Partnership also will lobby at the state and federal level to support legislation that address the recommendations made by a blue-ribbon panel of experts on the recent NMAC report, African Americans, Health Disparities and HIV/AIDS: Recommendations for Confronting the Epidemic in Black America. These will include policies designed to:

• Eliminate marginalization of and stigma and discrimination against black men who have sex with men (MSM)
  
  
• Reduce the impact of incarceration as a driver of new infections
   
• Reduce the role of Injecting drug use in sustaining the epidemic
   
• Expand proven HIV prevention, diagnosis and care programs
   
  
• Stabilize communities at risk by increasing affordable housing

In addition to government-level advocacy, the Partnership is committed to a community focus to reach those community level leaders and institutions, especially those in underserved and rural communities, with the greatest need for expanded HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, care and support services. Partnership members will join forces to:

• Challenge and attack the root causes of health disparities among communities of color;
  
  
• Address public policies that increase HIV risk in communities of color;
   
• Educate constituents and apply political pressure to ensure full funding for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, and for appropriate prioritization of services to communities of color disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS
   
• Encourage partner organizations to take bold action to raise the profile of the epidemic and needed responses