ADVOCATES FOR YOUTH

What about AIDS Prevention?

Advocates for Youth Calls on the Administration to Prioritize HIV/AIDS Prevention Education

Advocates for Youth Vice President Debra Hauser today expressed alarm that HIV/AIDS once again fell from the list of priorities of the Bush Administration.

In remarks announcing as his nominee for the Surgeon General, Richard Carmona, President Bush outlined three "urgent issues" that demand the focus of the nation's top doctor—bioterrorism, obesity, and alcohol and drug abuse. Conspicuously absent as a priority was the nation's on-going battle with HIV/AIDS.

As many as 900,000 people in the United States are living with HIV. Every year 40,000 more are infected. Half of these are young people under the age of 25. AIDS is the leading cause of death among African American males and the second leading cause of death among Latino men ages 25-44, many of whom contracted the disease while still in their adolescence.

"Clearly, this disease is robbing this nation of our most precious resource—America's youth," said Ms. Hauser. "While these issues outlined by the President are important, an additional priority for the new Surgeon General should be to implement a science-based HIV prevention strategy focused on young people's access to realistic sex education that includes medically accurate information about condoms."

In recent remarks at an MTV global forum, Secretary of State Colin Powell called on the international community to put political ideology aside, stating, "condoms are a way to prevent infection. Therefore, I not only support their use, I encourage their use among young people who are sexually active." Yet, the Bush Administration continues to support programs that censor information about condoms for the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS. The Administration's recent budget called for $135 million—a staggering 33 percent increase—in federal funding for ineffective abstinence-only-until-marriage programs.

Leading scientific agencies including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Institute of Medicine, the Society for Adolescent Medicine, and more than 100 other medical and professional organizations all support a more realistic approach to sex education—education that includes education about abstinence and condoms.

"It would be unfortunate if the political ideology of this Administration prevented a new Surgeon General from following the lead of these medical associations, his predecessor, Dr. David Satcher, and Secretary of State Colin Powell in advocating for programs that protect the sexual and reproductive health of young people," concluded Hauser.

Advocates for Youth is an international, nonprofit organization that creates programs and advocates for policies that help young people make safe, responsible decisions about their sexual and reproductive health.

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Note to Editors and Producers: For more information or to set up an interview with adolescent sexuality experts, please contact Bill Barker at (202) 419-3420.

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