Faith leaders press for major AIDS funds

Christian Century, Dec 27, 2003

Religious leaders of a variety of faiths prayed and lobbied in Washington, D.C., starting on the December 1 World AIDS Day in hopes of applying pressure on budget-makers to include enough money for the fight.

A prayer event that day outside the U.S. Treasury Department building urged further action from the Bush administration. The event, cosponsored by the United Methodist Church's social policy office, the Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism and Jubilee USA Network, urged President Bush to include in his 2005 budget at least $5.4 billion to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

The U.S. Senate adjourned for the holidays without approving the foreign aid bill, which contains what funding there is for AID programs from the U.S. But the letter to Bush signed by 85 interfaith religious figures asked for a commitment of $5 billion that would not only fight the disease but support debt cancellation for impoverished nations.

In a related move, the HIV/AIDS Caucus at the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility has filed resolutions with antiretroviral drug producers to widen access to the medicine in developing nations.

"Our colleagues in many developing countries are confronted with the ravages of AIDS every day," said Seamus Finn, who leads the public action office of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate and is one of the leading activists on the issue. "We believe the developers of these life-saving medicines have an obligation to make their products more accessible to the people who need them."