Category: Uncategorized

Important Happenings in HIV/Health Policy

Week Ending: May 25, 2018
By: Matthew Rose & Sable K. Nelson

Health Equity and Accountability Act Introduced in the House

Rep. Barbara Lee – on behalf of the Congressional Tri-Caucus made up the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, Congressional Black Caucus, and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus – introduced The Health Equity and Accountability Act of 2018 (HEAA), H.R. 5942. The introduction of HEAA in the Senate will be forthcoming from Sen. Mazi K. Hirono. In addition to Senator Hirono and Rep. Lee, dozens of members of the Congressional Tri-Caucus have co-sponsored the bill.

HEAA builds upon the strengths of the ACA and provides the additional tools necessary to address and eliminate health and health care disparities experienced by minority and underserved communities. The bill will eliminate existing access barriers to affordable health insurance coverage, promote investments in innovative health delivery methods and technologies, and advance research and data collection about the health needs and outcomes of diverse communities. The bill also ensures that a full range of culturally and linguistically appropriate health care and public health services are available and accessible in every community, creates a pipeline and new training opportunities for minority-serving professional and allied health care workers, and incorporates strategies to address a range of disease-specific mental and behavioral health issues facing minority communities. These are all important steps toward eliminating racial and ethnic health disparities, and creating a sustainable health care system that can pave the road to health equity. For more information,
READ this op-ed co-authored by  Reps. Lee and Chu in The Hill → http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/388977-health-equity-bill-offers-blueprint-for-nation-at-time-of; https://www.apiahf.org/resource/heaa_section_overview/

Trump Administration Proposes ‘Domestic Gag’ Rule
On May 22, 2018, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced a proposed change to a regulation that would affect the Title X program. Federally-funded Title X family planning clinics play a critical role in ensuring access to a broad range of family planning and preventive health services. The proposed regulation change would restrict family planning funding from certain health-care providers, such as Planned Parenthood, and block providers that participate in the Title X program from referring their patients for abortions. It is being referred to as the domestic gag rule, as it would likely prevent federal funding from going to any health clinic that even mentions abortion as an option for women. Comments on the proposed rule would be due 60 days after it is published in the Federal Register. However, HHS has not yet announced when it publish the proposed regulation. For more information,
READ → https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-new-domestic-gag-rule-planned-parenthood_us_5afef8cce4b0a046186b2e39

Understanding the Trump Administration’s Plan to Lower Prescription Drug Costs
Sarah Jane Tribble from the Kaiser Health Network explained the key elements of the 44-page document entitled “American Patients First; The Trump Administration Blueprint to Lower Drug Prices and Reduce Out-of-Pocket Costs” https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/AmericanPatientsFirst.pdf ) on CBS News’ “Red & Blue.” For more information,
WATCH → https://www.cbsnews.com/video/trumps-feud-with-prescription-drug-costs-began-during-his-campaign-and-continues-today/; https://khn.org/news/watch-whats-in-the-white-house-plan-to-lower-drug-prices/?utm_campaign=KHN%20-%20Weekly%20Edition&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=63242968&_hsenc=p2ANqtz–hb5VddnTmF2_hUdnmdQqomGW787zhjNampBkczXpbYfijgtABc17Pbkinzk9pZiljhI1d58KusoSIOv7TJ4l2sBqBSA&_hsmi=63242968

What NMAC is Doing About It

• NMAC remains vigilant in its advocacy to protect FY19 government funding and the existence of the social safety net.
• NMAC releaseda Biomedical HIV Prevention “Blueprint” entitled Expanding Access to Biomedical HIV Prevention: Tailoring Approaches for Effectively Serving Communities of Color, a new report that establishes strategies to effectively use techniques such as Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) and Treatment as Prevention (TasP) to end the HIV epidemic in communities of color. The full report can be found by visiting nmac.org/blueprint.
• NMAC will work with partners to determine its response to the pending domestic gag rule

What You Can Do About It.

TAKE ACTION: Speak truth to power by sharing your personal stories with your elected officials. It is vitally important to meet to your federal elected officials when they are at home. If we don’t support and advocate for HIV funding and programs, who will?  Our movement cannot afford to stand on the sidelines.  Your U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives need to hear from you. 

• Find your U.S. Senators: https://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
• Find your U.S. Representative: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative

Also, MAKE SURE THAT YOU ARE REGISTERED TO VOTE  in time for the primary and general elections happening this year:

 For more information, VISIT→ https://www.eac.gov/voters/register-and-vote-in-your-state/

Finally, PARTICIPATE IN THE PRIMARY ELECTION(S) in your state:

For more information, VISIT→ http://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/2018-state-primary-election-dates.aspx

Despite Gains in HIV, STD, and Hepatitis Funding, Omnibus
Bill Falls Short on Opioid Funding for Infectious Diseases

Washington, D.C. – Five of the nation’s leading organizations focused on ending the HIV, STD, and hepatitis epidemics in the United States – AIDS United, NASTAD, the National Coalition of STD Directors, NMAC, and The AIDS Institute – applaud Congress and the Administration for restoring critical funding for HIV and STDs and bolstering hepatitis programs. The Fiscal Year 2018 Omnibus Appropriations represents a down payment on shoring up the nation’s public health infrastructure, but it also falls short on necessary resources to combat the nation’s opioid crisis and associated infectious diseases.

With STD cases at the highest level ever recorded, Congress restored important funding for STD prevention, reversing a cut of $5 million that was passed last year. Congress also rejected proposed cuts to domestic HIV programs, including to the Secretary’s Minority AIDS Initiative, a crucial source of funding for HIV prevention, care, and treatment for communities of color, as well as the Ryan White Program and CDC HIV Prevention Programming. What’s more, Congress increased funding for the Housing Opportunities for People Living with AIDS (HOPWA) Program. We commend this action, but we also know more must be done to reduce the impact of HIV and STDs on our nation.

Congress also increased CDC hepatitis funding by $5 million, to $39 million, but it is far from the $100 million we believe is needed to institute prevention and education programs, increase testing and linkage to care and treatment, and implement surveillance systems to ensure jurisdictions across the country are adequately equipped to tackle the rapid increases in hepatitis and HIV due to injection drug use.

Moreover, our nation’s opioid epidemic remains virulent. The recent rise in injection-drug use not only accounts for a significant increase in overdoses, but also increases in hepatitis C, HIV, and STDs, particularly among young adults. The number of new hepatitis C cases nationwide nearly tripled between 2010 and 2015, and hepatitis C now kills more Americans than all other 60 notifiable infectious diseases combined. And STD rates show no signs of decline.

We commend Congress and the Administration for restoring crucial HIV and STD funding, and for expanding investment in viral hepatitis prevention — however minimal. Drug treatment and infectious disease prevention efforts can significantly reduce opioid addiction, overdose deaths, and new blood-borne infections. But sustaining the headway made in the struggle against hepatitis C, HIV, and STDs will require more than the bare minimum if we do not want to risk years of progress being undone.

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AIDS United (AU), NASTAD, the National Coalition of STD Directors (NCSD), NMAC, and The AIDS Institute (TAI) are national non-partisan, non-profit organizations focused on ending HIV in the U.S. They have been working in partnership to identify and share resources to sustain successes and progress we have made in HIV, STD, and hepatitis prevention, care and treatment in the United States.

National Native HIV Awareness Day is March 20
From time to time, we will feature voices from outside NMAC to talk about their communities and their work. This week, in honor of National Native HIV Awareness Day, we’re proud to spotlight Shana Christensen, a member of the Kiowa tribe in Oklahoma and a long-term HIV survivor and advocate.

There is a saying in Lakota that I really love: “Mitákuye Oyás’iŋ.” It means “All my Relations.” I’m not Lakota. We don’t have that saying in Kiowa, which is the tribe I hail from. Nevertheless, It’s always struck a chord with me. When I think about all the other Natives who are living with HIV, they feel like my family, even if I haven’t met them yet. Native Americans represent some two percent of the US population, yet in many areas of the country, our HIV rates as a race are super high, above whites and in some places, second highest.

> Read more from Shana                                                                                                                       Photo by Jeremy Charles

Want to Submit an Abstract for USCA? Join our         Re-Scheduled Webinar March 20
As some of you know, we had some technical difficulties with our March 7 webinar on submitting an abstract for USCA. We’ve worked to iron those problems out and have re-scheduled the webinar for Tuesday, March 20, at 3:00 PM EST. Join us and find out more about this process. And, once again, our apologies for the difficulties to all of those who joined us on March 7.
 > Register now!

Join Us for “Women and HIV in the South” Webinar March 21
Register now for the latest webinar in our Community Spotlight Series on March 21 at 3:00 PM EST. Gina Brown, Community Organizer for the Southern AIDS Coalition, will join us to talk about Women and HIV in the South.
> Register now!

One Week Left to Join NMAC’s Constituent Advisory Panels
Next Friday, March 23, is the deadline to apply to join NMAC’s Constituent Advisory Panels (CAPs). CAPs will advise NMAC on workshops, institutes, plenaries, and scholarship decisions for the 2018 USCA and Summit.
> For more information and to apply for CAP membership, visit our website.