Congress will be voting next week on passing a new version of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). This is a big deal, because while the old aid package has been pretty successful,* it doesn’t go far enough. There’s a whole bunch of kow-towing to crazy right wing anti-sex demands in the bill, which is no joke, because the more right wing nonsense gets stuck to the package, the more people die from AIDS that didn’t need to. Especially problematic is the refusal to put emphasis on prevention. The Democrats have a great opportunity to renew this, but with all these problems ironed out, saving a lot more lives. But it looks like they’re going to roll over on some key issues just to avoid a fight with the right wingers.

The main issues are that the bill, as rewritten by the Democrats, while it does finally get past the abstinence-only nonsense, still has loopholes that allow organizations that discuss abortion options with patients who are dealing with unplanned pregnancy to be denied funds on that basis. Which is that the global gag rule will be attached to PEPFAR. The sad irony is that the addition of the global gag rule is a new thing to PEPFAR, so the Democrats are overreaching in their attempts to kiss some right wing ass. Contraception for HIV positive women has not been included in the package, even though, as this interview with the Guttmacher’s Susan Cohen that I did this week explains, providing contraception to women who seek it is a low-cost, highly effective way to reduce the amount of perinatal HIV transmission. (The issue is complex and multi-tiered—I recommend listening to the interview to get the full scope of the issue. Understand that this is about helping women prevent pregnancies they don’t want, and is in no way meant to replace getting drugs to women carrying children to term who are trying to prevent perinatal transmission.) And there’s the issue of a pointless requirement that organizations who receive funds to help stop HIV transmission in the sex work community be required to sign an anti-prostitution pledge. All that accomplishes is that we pat ourselves on the back, and that actual prostitutes become wary of the organizations that are supposedly set out to help them, because they’ve openly stated that they’re against these women’s right to be free of legal harassment.

What can you do? Contact Speaker Pelosi’s office and demand that the Democrats pass a bill that puts saving lives and stopping HIV ahead of ideological feel-good crap that doesn’t help and only hurts.

*Maybe you saw “The Daily Show” segment they did on it where they had fun with the fact that the lives saved with PEPFAR might actually end up being the only good thing accomplished by the Bush administration? I know. I can’t believe that something positive has happened, myself.