[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 113 (Thursday, July 26, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5468-S5469]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                OUR SHARED COMMITMENT TO FIGHT HIV/AIDS

  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, today I rise to discuss the HIV/AIDS 
epidemic, the tremendous progress we have made thus far, and the need 
to do even more if we are going to stop this devastating disease in its 
tracks.
  The fight against HIV/AIDS has been a long one. In more than 30 
years, approximately 26 million people have died from AIDS, and there 
are still an astounding 7,000 new infections every day. But our 
commitment to combating this disease is making important strides.
  In the past decade, new HIV infections fell 20 percent, thanks in 
large part to the lifesaving antiretroviral treatment we and our 
partners are making available in every corner of the world that AIDS 
touches.
  We know that relatively healthy people with HIV who receive early 
treatment with antiretroviral drugs are 96 percent less likely to pass 
on the virus to their uninfected partners. So treating these 
individuals not only allows them to live their lives in dignity but is 
also an important key to prevention.
  In my home State of Maryland, the Jhpiego program has spent decades 
addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic in South America, Africa, Europe and 
Asia. Jhpiego has made enormous strides in prevention of mother-to-
child transmission, increasing counseling and testing and providing 
greater access to antiretroviral drugs.
  Jhpiego has integrated HIV/AIDS services with tuberculosis, cervical 
cancer, malaria in pregnancy, family planning and maternal and child 
health services, to address the problem of coinfection among HIV/AIDS 
patients and to reach as many people as possible. These integrated 
services represent the future of our health assistance. We have learned 
from programs like Jhpiego's what our best practices should be so that 
we are innovators in prevention, care, and treatment.

[[Page S5469]]

  I am pleased that Jhpiego and groups like it from across the globe 
are coming together for this week's AIDS 2012 conference in Washington, 
DC. This conference is the largest gathering of professionals working 
in the field of HIV in the world and will bring together more than 
20,000 people from more than 120 counties all working together to 
create a blueprint for combating HIV/AIDS. I can only imagine the 
exciting new synergies that will develop when so many innovative, 
committed individuals are in the same room.
  Among the presenters are luminaries from the public, private, and 
multilateral sectors such as President Bill Clinton, U.S. Secretary of 
State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and former U.S. First Lady Laura Bush, 
Her Highness Mette-Marit, Crown Princess of Norway, World Bank 
President Jim Yong Kim, UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidib, Sir 
Elton John, Whoopi Goldberg, and Bill Gates.
  This is the first time the United States has hosted the conference in 
two decades, and I believe it is the right moment for us to be 
showcasing our strong bipartisan effort to bring the AIDS epidemic to 
an end.
  The United States has long been a leader in the global fight against 
HIV/AIDS. As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on 
International Development Assistance, I am proud to note that from 2004 
to 2010 the United States spent more than $26 billion on bilateral 
funding to fight AIDS. From my experience leading this subcommittee, I 
know that dedicated government experts from an array of U.S. agencies 
are involved in the fight, as are thousands of nonprofits and community 
organizations.
  Yet despite the progress that the numbers and statistics tell us, the 
story on the ground is still heartbreaking, and now is not the time to 
rest on our laurels. International anti-AIDS funding has not increased 
significantly since 2008. In places like the Congo, for example, 
doctors are only able to supply antiretroviral drugs to 15 percent of 
the people who need them. Globally, just 8 million of the 15 million 
treatment-eligible patients in AIDS-ravaged poor regions of the world 
are getting antiretroviral drugs.
  We must do better. We must do better to improve the lives of people 
living with HIV/AIDS, and we must do better to save the lives of their 
loved ones.
  Some experts believe that ``fatigue and forgetting'' are two of the 
reasons we have not reached more people. Though we have been working on 
treating this disease for decades, we still have an overwhelming number 
of infections to treat.
  But the good news is that scientists now believe we have the tools to 
make serious progress in the fight against AIDS. Scientific advances 
over the last year have been remarkable, and we can't afford to abandon 
the fight and to lose momentum now.
  In a recent Washington Post article, Michel Sidibe, Executive 
Director of UNAIDS, the Joint United Nations Program on HIV and AIDS, 
said, ``The previous generation fought for treatment, our generation 
must fight for a cure.''
  I am proud that in just the last year, the National Institutes of 
Health has increased spending on cure-related research by $56 million. 
This is a step in the right direction, and I want to see us do more. I 
stand with the entire HIV/AIDS medical community in renewing the call 
to prevent, treat, and cure HIV/AIDS. Let's use the opportunity of this 
historic gathering to renew our call to work on creating an AIDS-free 
generation.

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