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Congresswoman Barbara Lee and Democratic Colleagues Send Letter to Budget Committee Asking for $5.4 Billion in FY 05 to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria
Washington, DC – Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) and 30 Democratic colleagues today sent a letter to the two leaders of the Budget Committee, asking that $5.4 billion be included in the FY 05 House Budget Resolution to meet the U.S. share of funding for HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria - both through bilateral programs and through the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. The House Budget committee will consider the FY 05 budget beginning tomorrow.
“While we recognize the budget constraints imposed by the US budget deficit, if we do not make the needed investment now and create the necessary room in the federal budget for this level of funding this year, then unnecessary infections and deaths will result in a mushrooming global calamity requiring even greater resources in the future,” Lee wrote in the letter. “By providing this level of funding - $3.6 billion for Global AIDS, and $1.8 billion for TB and Malaria - the United States will demonstrate its continued commitment as an international leader in the fight against these three dreadful diseases.”
Lee’s letter to Chairman Jim Nussle (R-IA) and Ranking Member John Spratt (D-SC) also expressed support for a $1.2 billion contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria in order to help leverage more money and resources from the international community to fight these three diseases.
“These three preventable and treatable infectious diseases kill about six million people each year,” said Lee. “In combination, they represent the worst humanitarian crises we face today and one of the gravest and most rapidly expanding threats to global stability. In part because these infectious diseases spread in a broader context of poverty, it is absolutely critical that the funds needed to address them in a realistic way complement, and not come at the expense of, other core humanitarian and development programs.”
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“While we recognize the budget constraints imposed by the US budget deficit, if we do not make the needed investment now and create the necessary room in the federal budget for this level of funding this year, then unnecessary infections and deaths will result in a mushrooming global calamity requiring even greater resources in the future,” Lee wrote in the letter. “By providing this level of funding - $3.6 billion for Global AIDS, and $1.8 billion for TB and Malaria - the United States will demonstrate its continued commitment as an international leader in the fight against these three dreadful diseases.”
Lee’s letter to Chairman Jim Nussle (R-IA) and Ranking Member John Spratt (D-SC) also expressed support for a $1.2 billion contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria in order to help leverage more money and resources from the international community to fight these three diseases.
“These three preventable and treatable infectious diseases kill about six million people each year,” said Lee. “In combination, they represent the worst humanitarian crises we face today and one of the gravest and most rapidly expanding threats to global stability. In part because these infectious diseases spread in a broader context of poverty, it is absolutely critical that the funds needed to address them in a realistic way complement, and not come at the expense of, other core humanitarian and development programs.”
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