ACT UP Philadelphia

It Could be a Wonderful Life for People with AIDS in 2012

2011-12-23T14:31:00.005-05:00

**please forward widely, post to facebook, etc**

Check out this fun “Wonderful Life” video ACT UP Philly just made, and please forward/post widely.

Since our housing campaign started, it has become a tradition for ACT UP to send our “holiday cheer” to Mayor Nutter around the holidays. In the past years this “cheer” has included bringing an army of Salvation Army style bell-ringers to city hall, and singing personalized carols outside of Nutter’s home.

However, unlike Scrooge or the Grinch, the Mayor has yet to change his ways and include dedicated money for HIV/AIDS housing in the city budget. In the cast of holiday characters Mayor Nutter is looking more and more like Mr. Potter from It’s a Wonderful Life...

So this holiday season we re-enacted one of the famous scenes from It’s a Wonderful Life as a secret meeting between Mayor Nutter, Governor Corbett, City Council members, Health Commissioner Don Schwarz, local corporate CEOs and ACT UP members. (The original scene from the movie can be viewed online here.) Hope you have as much fun watching it as we did making it!

Wishing you and your loved ones a Happy Holiday and New Year.

xoxo,
ACT UP Philly

PS - We're a group of a bunch of volunteers taking on the big city, full of Mr. Potter's. Next year, we have big plans for continuing to raise the stakes on the City and win housing for people with HIV. But without your help, we won't be able to do it. If you are the kind of person who makes donations at the end of the year (and even if you're not!), then please consider donating to ACT UP. As Rachel Maddow once said, there's no group where you get a better bang for your buck than ACT UP Philly! Click here to donate now.

Russia: ITPC World AIDS Day Events

2011-12-09T13:36:00.003-05:00

December 1, 2011
ST. PETERSBURG
FLASHMOB AND STARS
December 1, 2011. The following activists and volunteers of non-governmental organizations in St. Petersburg and Leningrad region joined together for an unprecedented event associated with the World AIDS Day under the slogan “Know and Live”:
E.V.A. Non-Profit Partnership to increase the quality of life for women living with and affected by HIV-infection and other socially significant diseases, MadStyleGroup Creative Holding, MadMedia Communication Project, Dance4life Social Project, International Treatment Preparedness Coalition in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (ITPCru), Svecha Organization of People living with HIV, “Positive Dialogue” community of people living with HIV/AIDS, “Red Ribbon” Foundation and Salvation Army volunteers.

The event was held in two stages, the first part being a march from Anichkov Bridge to Gallery Trade Centre 6.30 p.m, joined by more than 200 people. The young activists walked along Nevskiy Prospect, telling the passers-by about the World AIDS Day. The participants stopped beside several subway stations, handing out booklets about HIV/AIDS and red ribbons to the passers-by with the following words: “HIV is not transmitted via information. Take care of your own health and the health of those you love”. In total, more than 2 000 copies were distributed. The second part took place in Gallery Trade Centre from 7.00 p.m. till 7.40 p.m. The people who were in the Gallery at that time got a chance to learn more about HIV epidemic, take part in a dance flashmob and enjoy a show involving stars of the Russian show business, T9 and In2nation pop groups and “Studio 17” dance group.
Another symbol of the event was a heart, to which everyone caring about the epidemic, being ready to take the responsibility for their own lives, and empathizing with those affected by the epidemic, could tie a red ribbon. By the event of the event, the heart was red with ribbons, and even after the end people with kept coming and tying their ribbons to the heart.
All the participants said that they managed to draw the attention of people in the Gallery and on the streets. In total, more than 400 people took part in the event.
DECEMBER 1 – MOSCOW
UNSANCTIONED PROTEST ACTION BESIDE THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH
Yet another protest action was held in front of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation by Patients Control Movement, with the funeral orchestra and two coffins representing failing treatment and prevention programmes in the country, leading to numerous deaths. The activists state that the absence of mandatory treatment guidelines puts the whole AIDS response in the country at risk. At the same time, several regions in Russia still face stock-outs of diagnostics and regimen changes due to non-clinical indications (as is underlined by the report issued within the framework of the Simona+ monitoring project). Russian patients still have no access to tenofovir, despite the facts that tenofovir-based regimens are included in the WHO guidelines.

The event received broad coverage in the mass media, some activists were detained by the police and then released.

PRESS CONFERENCE HELD BY THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH
One of the Patients Control Initiative representatives took part in the press conference of MoH. At the end of the press conference, Ilya Lapin asked questions about the unsolved problems, namely lack of test kits, nevirapine for children, which has not been purchased by MoH, and absence of HIV treatment guidelines.

PRESS CONFERENCE WITH V. POZNER AND DANCE4LIFE
Alexandra Volgina spoke about problems with access to diagnostics, stock-outs of ART, lack of communication with MoH, and other issues raising concerns among the activists regarding access to HIV treatment in Russia.

ARTICLE IN ROSSIYSKAYA GAZETA (THE RUSSIAN NEWSPAPER)
Gaps in the list – Russia lacks essential medications for combating AIDS
Official Newspaper of The Government of the Russian Federation.
Circulation: 185 445 copies (as of 2nd half of 2010). Coverage: 44 cities of Russia, with regional inserts and issue-related supplements. The newspaper issues a series of books with state documents and comments.

FAX ATTACK ON MoH

December 1
- 50 organizations from different countries sent a fax to MoH, drawing their attention to the issue of access to tenofovir and nevirapine.
Nevirapine for children has not been purchased by the MoH, despite the fact that only one month is left till the end of the year.
Tenofovir is not included in the list of essential drugs, and MoH does not purchase it for Russian patients.

On average, a fax from activists was sent every ten minutes.

--
Best regards,
Sergey Golovin
Public Relations Officer
http://itpcru.org
sergey.golovin@itpcru.org
+7953 345 9890
Skype: sergej.golovin

Housing is Healthcare Panel

2011-11-18T23:20:00.001-05:00

Tonight I had the honor to be on a panel with ACT UP member and peer educator Cliff Williams, Chief of Staff of the Philly Dept. of Health Nan Feiler, and Representative Jim McDermott (D-Wa.) It was neat to convene all of these people to talk about federal and local solutions to the AIDS housing crisis in Philadelphia.

I just learned that the camera battery ran out before we got to me, and since my notes (see photo) are illegible even to me, I thought I'd try to recreate at least the gist of the speech so that the ideas can keep being used.

So here goes:

"I'm going to keep this short. As the med students here know, events in this room always end the same way: with homework. And that's my job for tonight. I've got homework for all of you, but most of my homework is for you, Ms. Feiler, so I hope you're taking notes.

We've heard from the politicians here tonight, and one thing that we've heard is that they can't do this alone. We need to step up and create the change we want to see. We need to push them. Well, that's what we're doing right now. Consider yourselves pushed. We need politicians to step up now, like Representative McDermott did with Representatives Pelosi and Schumer when they started HOPWA as freshmen in Congress.

Right now we don't have a champion like Representative McDermott in Philadelphia. There's no one person who is solving this crisis. And here's the reason I think that's happening. I had a slide but I'm not going to show it now, but it basically shows that the funding, the funding coming into and out of the city for AIDS housing, is like a giant plate of spaghetti. It's just this tangled mush.

You heard Ms. Feiler say that there is a historic collaboration happening at the city between all the stakeholders in AIDS housing, and I'll be those of you taking notes didn't catch all the different agencies she named. It's this alphabet soup of agencies with lots of Os and Hs and Cs and Ds, and they're all overseeing different funding.

You've got the Office of Supportive Housing who oversees the shelters and they are in charge of the Shelter + Care slots, which are for people with AIDS who have substance abuse or mental health issues. So that's a more restricted program, that comes from HUD McKinney-Vento funds and you have to meet certain requirements.

Then you have HOPWA funding, which comes in through another office, the Office of Housing and Community Development with Ms. Deborah McCulloch. The great thing about HOPWA funding, as Representative McDermott referenced, is that it's less bureaucratic that McKinney-Vento. That money can be used to help someone who is not currently homeless but is in imminent danger of becoming homeless. Or they have HIV but not an AIDS diagnosis, but if they can't get their housing stabilized they might get a lot sicker. Someone who just needs some cash to make up the difference in their rent, they can get a shallow rent subsidy* that will actually turn out to be cheaper than paying for them to end up in a shelter or sick in the hospital.

So you have this moosh, right, with two agencies overseeing the funding, and then it's a separate agency, AACO, which is under Ms. Feiler, that oversees the waiting list for people who need housing. The agencies that get the funding and do the planning aren't the ones that keep track of the need. And we don't even really know what the need is since we haven't done a needs assessment since 1996, and people with substance abuse and mental health issues who aren't actively in treatment lose their slots on the waiting list. So we aren't even keeping track of who those folks are, people with substance abuse and mental health issues who are most in need of housing.

The people who really know what the need is are the providers, who actually run the programs, and then of course the people with HIV and AIDS who are homeless. They know what the need is, but they aren't the ones who keep the waiting list, or who do the planning, or get the money.

What should be happening is that there should be one central place where someone can go and say, 'look, this is my housing situation' and we'll be able to say this is what's available, whether you just need some cash to pay the rent and keep from getting evicted, or you need an SRO to stay out of the shelter, or you need more care because you're dealing with blindness or the mental health issues from living with the virus.

What we have instead is that we don't have different kinds of housing, it just comes from whatever each provider is interested in, so we might not have the exact level of care you need, maybe it's more support than you need or it's not enough support and so we're paying more than we have to or you're ending up getting sick, back on the streets and we're paying for health care.

The city's plan needs to close that information loop. We need the people who know what the need is to maintain the list, to inform the planning, to create the housing. We're losing information and money at each step of the cycle and it's the city's job to make a plan to fix the moosh of agencies.

The other job the city needs to step up and do is figure out where to get the resources. We've heard from the politicians that the state isn't going to fund us, the federal government isn't going to fund us. They might think, 'ok, we're getting less money, we can serve less people, that means less work on this issue, I can focus on other things.' I'm sorry to say, that's wrong. Now is the time for the city to get creative and to figure out other ways to solve this crisis.

Here's the problem. We've heard that housing people with AIDS saves money, but the money that it saves isn't city money. It saves money for hospitals, for Medicare and Medicaid, for insurance companies, because people aren't getting as sick. What the city needs to do is to figure out how to realize those cost savings. It's been done before. Right here at Penn, there's a program called LIFE, Living Independently for the Elderly, and they actually get money from Medicare and Medicaid that they're saving them by supporting older folks to live independently and stay out of expensive hospitals and nursing facilities.

I know it's Republicans at the state level, but they actually like saving money. And they don't like spending money on Medicare and Medicaid. So the city needs to go to them and say look, you don't have to spend this money for Medicare and Medicaid, you can spend it in Philly, create jobs. Even Republicans like jobs.

Ms. Feiler was very smart to say we need to watch what happens with these Housing First slots at Pathways. We need to keep track of how much money we're saving in hospital bills, and we need to go to the hospitals and Medicare and Medicaid and the insurance companies with the bill and say, here's what we saved you, now you need to pay us back so we can invest it in housing and make 20 more or 40 or 60 more slots. But the city needs to be ready with that research and a plan, ready to go to the hospital with a bill for what we've saved them.

I think there are some other ways to get creative too. What we've learned from the Occupy movement is that there are better ways to tax and get revenue. There wouldn't be an Occupy movement here in Philadelphia if we were doing all we could to raise revenue. There's a big insurance company right here in Philly, Blue Cross, who's got a big chunk of land here, and I don't think they're paying their fair share of the taxes. What if we could go to them and say, 'look, we're actually saving you money for the people you insure, they're not getting sicker, instead they're getting housing. Here's how you can contribute to the public health.' We can create public-private partnerships and have them pay taxes and solve this crisis.

Speaking of paying your fair share of taxes... the very institution that we're in right now, they need to be paying their fair share. As a non-profit, Penn doesn't pay any property taxes to the city. So they own all this non-profit land. But what are they doing with it? Making lots of money off of it, and putting for-profit businesses on it. So Penn needs to pay its fair share.

Now, time for your homework assignment. Ms. Feiler already talked about the postcards that are under your chairs. We really didn't intend to imply that Deputy Mayor Schwarz doesn't care about people with AIDS or homelessness. We just do wish he were here. He's a very smart guy and a good listener and this has been an amazing conversation. So we wish he were here to be a part of it because the more heads the better.

Also, the reason for the "wish you were here" slogan is that my sweetheart, Kaytee, is a designer and she's been dying to try out this vintage postcard font, so that's why we chose that.

Anyway, we think it is important Deputy Mayor Schwarz and as many people in his office as possible hear about the AIDS housing crisis in Philadelphia, so we'd like you fill the postcards out and say what you think, based on what you heard tonight, must be included in the plan to end the AIDS housing wait list in Philadelphia. And then we'll deliver them and hopefully they will inspire our local Representative McDermott, our local champion within the government who will end this crisis.

Thank you."

*I was reminded at the end of the panel by Gary Tumolo from OHCD that only San Diego has ever effectively applied to use HOPWA funds for shallow rent subsidies, and Philadelphia applied and was denied. I wonder if Representative McDermott might be able to help us think about how to get Philadelphia approved, as part of a comprehensive AIDS housing strategy?

Sunday 11/8: ACT UP @ Occupy Philly TWICE!

2011-11-03T11:47:00.000-04:00

ACT UP's going to be at Occupy Philly TWICE on Sunday.

First, we are doing a direct action workshop at noon.

ACT UP Philadelphia has been using direct action to win major victories for people with HIV since 1988. Come learn one model of direct action organizing that has worked to build a movement that is lead by low-income people, people of color, queer people, and people with HIV. Jose de Marco and Kaytee Riek will talk about how we plan and execute smart actions that get to the people in power and get covered accurately by the media, and how we interact with the cops throughout the action.

Sunday, November 6th at Noon at **NEW LOCATION** Thomas Paine Plaza/Municipal Services Building - Broad and JFK, where the game pieces are, across from City Hall.

After the presentation, there will be a discussion of other models of direct action organizing that you have seen work in other contexts, and we'll come up with a quick, effective and strategic direct action that everyone can take.

Second, ACT UP will have a speaker as a part of a discussion called "You can have your playground when you/we fix our city!", from 4-6pm at the GA area.

Occupy Philly sits in the way of a $50 million development that will turn Dilworth Plaza, currently public space where homeless people live and share free food, into a privatized ice-skating rink and cafe: a playground for tourists and those with cash. We'd rather use that $50 million for homes, lasting jobs, education, health care, gardens, and other community-controlled efforts to rebuild our city.

** What would YOU do to fix our city with $50 million? **

The city has hinted that renovations may start around November 15, meaning that Occupy Philly and the many people living there will have to leave. We would like to take this moment of tension as an opportunity to highlight the unjust allocation of resources in Philadelphia and the hard work that organizers have already been doing to rebuild our communities. How to respond to the city's demand that we make way for this "playground for the rich" is an ongoing debate in which we welcome your voice.
Occupy Philly's new and dynamic energy has inspired us to try out an interactive discussion workshop style!

So come out Sunday and join us!

Karaoke + $$ for ACT UP = an awesome Saturday

2011-09-12T03:32:00.004-04:00

Summer is over, but there is always time to party! Please join us next Saturday, October 1st for a night at Adobe Café where we will be raising funds for the one and only ACT UP Philadelphia.

We have been doing a lot of awesome and badass work surrounding our housing campaign, but in order to continue the fight, we really REALLY need your support. So come for good company, food, drinks, singing, dancing, you name it! Great vegan and non-alcoholic options are available!

Where: Adobe Cafe 1919 E. Passyunk Ave 19148 in South Philadelphia

When: October 1st, 7:30- 12:30

*20% of all drink proceeds will go to ACT UP between 8:00 and 10:30 so get there early, we’ll be there! Plus, we'll be belting out tunes sung in embarrassing ways. Come sing, so people don't have to listen to us :)

Spread the word on Facebook!

ACT UP's got a brand new website

2011-08-11T16:16:00.002-04:00

We have a new website! It's stylish and activist-y, and the best place to go to learn about what we're up to.
On it, you can:

sign up to get email updates
read our latest news
find out how to get in touch with us
get meeting location details
read our report on the housing crisis
buy spiffy new tshirts (!)
and make a donation to our work

In fact, if you could make a donation to support our work right now, that would be fantastic. We are planning a big Fall push to get money in the budget for AIDS housing next time, but we need the resources to do it.

So, head to actupphilly.organd click "donate". Or just click around and see what we're up to.
Got comments on the site (you love it! you found a broken link. it looks weird on your computer)? Send 'em to us at actupphilly at gmail dot com. We can't promise we'll make changes, but the feedback will help us to continue to improve it.
Thanks for your continued support!

Nutter/Obama demo photos, all that I took

2011-07-06T22:17:00.001-04:00

Obama/Nutter: We insist, end the waiting lists!

2011-07-02T07:32:00.000-04:00

Our action outside (and inside!) Obama's fundraiser got a lot of attention from the media. Besides a rowdy march from City Hall to the Bellevue (where Obama was fundraising), ACT UP Philadelphia had five people inside disrupting the President's speech. Why? Because Obama promised us that he would insure universal access to AIDS treatment. But he hasn't kept his promise - 8,000 are on waiting lists in the US, and another 9-10 million desperately need but cannot get life-saving treatment around the world. We can end AIDS, if Obama keeps his promise!

We also called attention to our Mayor's failure to address the growing crisis of housing for people with HIV. It's shameful that people with AIDS are warehoused in shelters or left to die on the streets, rather than get housing that can save their lives and reduce HIV rates in the city as a whole.

AP via Washington Post - "Once inside, Obama was interrupted by at least two activists holding up paper signs calling for more AIDs drugs for victims of the disease. “Obama: AIDs drugs 4 6 million people worldwide. WeCanEndAIDS.org.” Obama watched impassively as other supporters drowned the activists out and snatched the signs from their hands. Obama has encountered AIDs protesters before, including a fundraiser in Miami earlier this month."

CNN - "But the crowd wasn't entirely supportive. At one point, the president was interrupted by a small gathering of protesters, critical of the president over the issue of AIDS."

ABC News - "His speech was punctuated twice by hecklers, including some AIDS activists who have now made it a practice to interrupt Obama’s campaign events."

Philly Inquirer -

Philly Inquirer Photos (flip over to photo 11 and 29)

Metro Philly

PoliticsPA - "The event was interrupted briefly by a handful of demonstrators from ACT UP Philadelphia, a group dedicated to fighting AIDS. “President Obama! We love you! But please keep your promise to spend $15 billion fighting AIDS,” one man yelled."

City Paper - "AIDS activists ACT UP Philly will be rallying against Obama, who is coming to Philly to fundraise, due to anticipated cuts in HIV/AIDS funding. (The group will also be protesting against Mayor Michael Nutter — who is expected to join Obama at a fundraiser at the Hyatt at the Bellevue — to demand funding for housing for people with AIDS.)"

Finally, some photos from the protest, by ACT UP member Kaytee Riek.

June 30th Action: WTF (Where's the Funding)?!?

2011-06-16T11:17:00.000-04:00

NUTTER & OBAMA: BROKEN AIDS PROMISES KILL

Join us Thurs. June 30 at 3 PM at the SE corner of City Hall

No housing $ for people w/AIDS in the budget? And broken promises on funding for AIDS treatment at home and abroad from the President?

Where’s The Funding, Nutter & Obama?!

ACT UP. FIGHT BACK.

Mayor Nutter’s proposed 2012 budget contains no money for housing for people with HIV—but it does include an 11% increase in funding for jails.

On June 30, City Council will most likely approve Nutter’s disastrous budget. Hundreds of people with AIDS are on a waiting list for AIDS housing. Hundreds more are in need. The Mayor is refusing to take action.

President Obama has to power to help end the global AIDS pandemic—by increasing investments now in prevention and treatment, landmark new data show that 7 million deaths and 12 million new HIV infections can be prevented. But the Administration is preparing for cuts in 2012—not the increases needed.

On June 30, Obama will be at the Bellevue Hotel at Broad and Walnut for a fundraiser with his Philadelphia donors. Mayor Nutter will join him.

At the Bellevue June 30, Obama & Nutter will be fundraising for reelection.

We will be there to let them know there will be no reelection w/out funding to keep people with AIDS in philly and abroad alive. Will you be there?

DEMAND AIDS PREVENTION AND TREATMENT JUSTICE

Photos from NYC roving die-in

2011-05-16T15:05:00.001-04:00

Design the next great ACT UP t-shirt!

2011-05-05T15:17:00.001-04:00

**Please forward widely and share w/ artist-activists everywhere**

Call for Artistic Submissions: a New Shirt Design for ACT UP Philadelphia!
Deadline May 20th, 2011

Want your art memorialized in newspapers and in photo art exhibits while splayed across the chests of fierce AIDS Activists? Does it make you excited to have your name join the likes of Keith Haring as a t-shirt designer for the coolest activists who’ve worked to save thousands of lives?
What better way to go down in history than as the person that designed the active wear of an activist?

Help us look fierce and hot. The ideal t-shirt design will relate to our campaigns. We are not looking for a generic “AIDS awareness” t-shirt. We want to find the next great “Silence=Death” political shirt (google it if you’re unfamiliar).

Some recent issues that we have worked on are listed below. What you chose as a theme is up to you and not restricted to the list, naturally:

- Fighting for the right to housing for all people with HIV and AIDS

- Demanding access to condoms in Philly prisons and for high school students

- Tearing down the barriers to access to medication for people in the US and worldwide

Potential Questions you might have:

How do I submit? The deadline is May 20th at midnight ET. All t-shirt designs must be emailed to actupphilly@gmail.com by then to be accepted. We cannot accept anything that comes after midnight ET on May 20th. Please include the name you would like to be called, and a way to reach you (phone, email, twitter account… whatever is the best way to tell you if you’ve won!).

What are the design specifications? Art should be designed in Adobe Illustrator or another vector design program, and sent in vectored EPS and PDF formats. It should be one color. You can suggest the t-shirt color and screen-printing color we should use.

What is the decision process? ACT UP members will convene on May 23rd to decide on our one or two favorite designs. Winners will be announced on May 24th, and t-shirts will be printed by mid-June.

What does the winning artist(s) get? Glory! The love of activists everywhere! A free t-shirt! But no money, sadly.

What if I have more questions? Contact actupphilly@gmail.com and we’ll get back to you ASAP.

Fine Print: The T-Shirt Design Competition is open to anyone worldwide who has an idea of what our shirts should say. All t-shirt designs will become property of ACT UP Philadelphia. We don’t copyright, so your design cannot be copyrighted. Because we are an awesome activist group that doesn’t take money from the government or drug companies (read: our budget is super small!), there is no monetary compensation to the winners.

Photos from the disruption of Nutter's budget speech

2011-03-03T14:46:00.001-05:00

Media, bloggers, and others are welcome to use any photos, as long as they are credited to "Kaytee Riek, ACT UP Philadelphia". Email us if you'd like a full resolution version!

ACT UP PROTESTS BUDGET SPEECH, DEMANDS FUNDING FOR HOMES FOR PEOPLE WITH AIDS

2011-03-03T13:57:00.001-05:00

PHILADELPHIA – As Mayor Nutter presented his 2012 budget to City Council, members of ACT UP Philadelphia disrupted his speech to demand that he fund homes for people with AIDS in Philadelphia. “People with AIDS are dying for homes,” said ACT UP member Jose de Marco, one of the approximately twenty people who disrupted the Mayor’s speech. “The Mayor told us directly that he lives in a political world and can’t do anything to save sick people’s lives. We’re here to make this problem a political problem for the Mayor, since he’s refused to act out of moral imperative.”

ACT UP has been campaigning for nearly two years to force the City to invest in housing for people with AIDS. According to thousands of pages of peer-reviewed research, housing is just as important as treatment in improving health outcomes, and is a vital part of HIV prevention. “It would save the city money and save lives, plain and simple,” said ACT UP member Antonio Davis. “But instead, the Mayor is taking the easy way out.”

Carla Fields, an ACT UP member who is currently on the two-year-long waiting list for housing subsidies, said the City needs to fix this problem, because shelters are unsafe for people with HIV. “I have had 75% of my body eaten up by bedbugs in the shelter. The Mayor apologized to me personally for having to suffer and get sick in the shelter system, but I don’t want his apology. I want him to end the AIDS housing waiting list!”

In November 2010, ACT UP met with Mayor Nutter and his staff to explain why the City needed to invest in housing for people with HIV. Along with representatives from the University of Pennsylvania, they laid out the evidence for providing homes to everyone in need, and especially to those living with HIV. At that time, the Mayor said that he couldn’t make any commitments and he doesn’t know where the resources could come from. ACT UP’s solution – “stop warehousing people in shelters, and instead invest in rent subsidies which actually solve the problem and keep people healthy”, says Max Ray, one of the authors of ACT UP’s Housing Report “Dying for Homes”.

The budget now goes on to City Council for review and amendment. “We believe that Council Members will understand the importance of addressing the AIDS housing crisis, and we hope they will act to fix Nutter’s budget and ensure that $2-4 million is added to the budget to end the waiting list,” said Cliff Williams, a formerly homeless member of ACT UP who finally got housing subsidies through the City late last year. “Housing is saving my life. Everyone needs to have access to housing so their lives can be saved too.”

###

Press Release - Embargoed until March 3, 2011 at 1pm ET
Contact: Max Ray – 215-908-8939

Homes, not Graves, for People with AIDS

2011-02-24T08:12:00.003-05:00

PHILADELPHIA – On March 3rd, Mayor Michael Nutter will release his budget proposal for next year. On Thursday, February 24th ACT UP Philadelphia (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) will preemptively hold a demonstration at City Hall to remind him that, “time’s up, wake up: include money in the city budget for housing for people with HIV/AIDS.”

WHAT: Time’s Up, Nutter!: Fund Homes not Graves for People with HIV/AIDS
WHEN: Thursday, February 24th @ 10:30am WHERE: at the Love Park sign at 15th and JFK St.

“There is a crisis in our city. People with HIV/AIDS are dying on the streets, and Mayor Nutter has done nothing to address the situation,” said ACT UP member Jose de Marco. “We are coming to tell Mayor Nutter and City Council that the time is up, the stakes are high, they need to include funding in the budget to end the current waiting list for HIV/AIDS housing.”

According to the city's own 2008 report to Housing and Urban Development (HUD) at the federal government, there are 8,000 individuals with HIV/AIDS in Philadelphia who are in need of housing assistance. This includes people living in unsafe and unstable housing situations – on the streets, in shelters, in cars, or on the couches of family members. When HIV+ people are in such situations, they are more likely to delay starting, or stop taking, life-saving medication, which leads to more hospital visits and increased resistance to medication.

ACT UP members, along with allies from the University of Pennsylvania, met with Mayor Nutter in November 2010 to share their experiences in the shelters and on the streets, and laid out why they felt Mayor Nutter had no choice but to fund housing for people with HIV/AIDS. At the meeting, the Mayor said that he agreed that housing was important, but that he “lives in a political world” and that it would not be possible for him to fund housing for people with HIV.

“The Mayor’s response to the direct appeal from homeless people with HIV/AIDS was astounding. We come to the Mayor and explain how he’s clearly wasting money and leaving people to die on the streets and he’s not willing to even say he’d try to find the money. It’s crazy!” said ACT UP member Carla Fields.

Beyond saving the lives of people with HIV/AIDS, housing is also a critical tool for HIV/AIDS prevention. People in unstable housing situations are more likely to engage in unsafe activities like sharing needles or having unprotected, and often coerced, survival sex. When people with HIV/AIDS have access to safe and stable housing, they are more likely to take their medication on time. Taking anti-HIV medication regularly lowers the amount of virus in a person’s blood, making them less likely to transmit HIV to others. “If you meet people’s most basic need – shelter – then people are healthier all around, which will save the city money,” said ACT UP member Cliff Williams. “Prioritizing housing for people with HIV/AIDS saves lives and money.”

Two to four million dollars per year would provide sufficient funding to end the current housing waiting list for people with HIV/AIDS. According to a report released by Penn Graduate Students, the HIV/AIDS housing waiting list has fluctuated between 150 and over 200 people this year. They estimate that for less than the cost of providing care in shelters, the city could provide rental assistance that would help get people out of shelters and unstable housing conditions (which pose a specific hazard to the immuno-compromised) and into real housing. Other needs could be met through streamlining the city’s case management process and providing targeted care to those with complicated substance abuse, or mental health needs.

“Hopefully by reminding Mayor Nutter of the importance of this issue he will do the right thing and include enough money to end the HIV/AIDS housing waiting list in his budget. If not, well, it’s pretty hard to ignore sick people with HIV/AIDS when they are ringing alarm clocks outside your office,” said Cliff Williams.

###

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - February 22, 2011

Contact: Antonio Davis, 267-592-2837

Tell Nutter Time's Up!

2011-02-21T18:34:00.002-05:00

TIME'S UP NUTTER!

City budget is about due-

You gonna leave people with AIDS in the gutter?

THURSDAY FEBRUARY 24th, 10am

Join with ACT UP to wake up the Mayor

There are people with AIDS living on the street in our city, & until the city funds housing, people are going to continue to get sick & die.

We Meet at LOVE Park@10am, then go to City Hall to set off our alarms

Bring your Alarm clock, fog horn, rooster or preferred noisemaker.

Sangamo's Bet Against AIDS: Gene Therapy

2011-02-12T15:35:00.000-05:00

BusinessWeek: "Timothy Brown may be the only person cured of AIDS. Brown, who lives in San Francisco, in 2007 received a stem-cell transplant in Berlin that transferred genetic material to him from one of the up to 2 percent of humans with a natural immunity to the disease. He has been off treatment since then, and no traces of the AIDS virus have been found in his body, says his hematologist, Gero Hütter, now with the German Red Cross in Mannheim. His case has encouraged tiny Sangamo BioSciences (SGMO) to develop a new form of gene therapy that could offer others the same result."

We're "Warriors"

2011-02-10T13:47:00.001-05:00

ACT UP Philadelphia members have been dubbed "Warriors" in the cover story of this week's City Paper. Go pick it up! Or read it online.

Some of our favorite parts:

"ACT UP isn't just another advocacy group: They are the A-Team of AIDS activism, a band of crack commandos always ready to parachute in, their rhetorical guns blazing. Fail to listen and suffer the consequences: They've been known to swarm the mayor's home to demand housing for people with AIDS, take over the Capitol Rotunda to press Congress to lift a federal ban on funding syringe exchanges, and shut down the Food and Drug Administration in protest of slow approval times for AIDS drugs."

And some more we like:
"Those remaining AIDS activists began to shift their focus to policy on the global AIDS epidemic, or began working for the government, trying to change the system from within. ACT UP Philly, though, plotted a different course.

"Other chapters were dwindling or dying because white men were leaving," says longtime member Paul Davis. "But we decided to be aggressive about putting race and poverty at the core of every campaign, to be really up-front about who AIDS was now affecting."

Though the face of AIDS had changed, he says, one truth remained: "Nothing has ever been given to people with AIDS. All we've ever gotten, we've fought for."

And finally, some more good stuff:

The group understands that AIDS hasn't gone away but has instead been moving to new populations: poor folks, the homeless, drug users. The disease has seen a pronounced increase in black communities, as well: According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, African-Americans make up just 14 percent of the U.S. population but 50 percent of all diagnosed HIV cases. That's up by 4 percent since 2009. Black females, meanwhile, are 19 times more likely to contract HIV than whites, while black men are eight times more likely. More and more, the virus is attacking very specific, often impoverished neighborhoods such as Germantown and Southwest Philadelphia.

So ACT UP Philly began to lobby for issues that hadn't previously been part of AIDS activism: for more housing for people with AIDS, for people in shelters to be able to control their own AIDS medication. And they began recruiting new members in unexpected places, like halfway houses, shelters and jails.

But read the whole article. It makes ACT UP Philly look amazing! But we are amazing. Surprised?

PEPFAR’s Smart Investments to Save More Lives: Efficiencies, Innovation, Impact

2011-02-07T23:39:00.000-05:00

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE: "On Thursday, February 10, 2011, PEPFAR will hold a one-day forum entitled “PEPFAR’s Smart Investments to Save More Lives: Efficiencies, Innovation, Impact.” The meeting will spotlight PEPFAR’s work to gain greater impact and efficiency through smart investments in programs working to save lives from HIV/AIDS. The discussion will build upon PEPFAR’s ongoing efforts to maximize the impact of every dollar spent."

Note: Draft agenda at https://asoft130.securesites.net/secure/causda/clientuploads/design/Pepfar/SmartInvestments/DRAFT_Agenda-PEPFAR_Smart_Investments_Meeting.pdf

Mouse hormone trial raises hopes for HIV cure

2011-02-04T23:11:00.002-05:00

ABC Australia: "MARC PELLEGRINI: If we treat those mice with interleukin therapy we can actually clear this virus which is really quite overwhelming in the mice and is never cleared.

"So if we have two cohorts of mice, one given a placebo, those mice never clear the infection and it really overwhelms the immune system and the immune system succumbs to the disease.

"Whereas in the mice that are treated with interleukin-7 for three weeks we can actually effect the cure such that the virus is actually eliminated from their blood and from most of their, or indeed all of their organs like the lung and the brain which are sort of reservoirs for that particular virus in the mice.

"SIMON LAUDER: Does it follow that the same therapy could be used to clear HIV in humans?

"MARC PELLEGRINI: It would certainly follow that the same therapy could be used to boost immunity in HIV and either better control or perhaps even cure HIV in the long term."

Note: Technical abstract at http://www.cell.com/abstract/S0092-8674(11)00012-2.

ACT UP Philadelphia Mourns Ugandan Gay Rights Activist David Kato’s Death

2011-02-03T11:56:00.001-05:00

We Demand the Ugandan Government Conduct Full Investigation and Confront Homophobia

Today, the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power in Philadelphia (ACT UP Philadelphia) is standing in solidarity with Sexual Minorities of Uganda (SMUG) and concerned civil society in Uganda and around the world in condemning the brutal murder of gay rights activist David Kato in his home on Wednesday, the 26th of January 2011. ACT UP Philadelphia sent letters to President Yoweri Museveni, Inspector General of Police Major Kale Kayihura, and Minister of Justice Hon. Makubuya Kiddu demanding the Government of Uganda and Police fully investigate David’s murder and confront current homophobia.

In the past year, ACT UP Philadelphia has worked with SMUG and other LGBTI, HIV/AIDS, and human rights activists in Uganda, the United States and around the world to fight against the Anti-Homosexuality Bill introduced in Ugandan parliament. This bill included the death penalty for "repeat homosexual offenders" and HIV+ persons found to be committing "homosexual acts." The repressive and violent nature of that bill not only put the lives of LGBTI Ugandans in jeopardy, it also greatly hampers the successes of HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment programs. The hostile political and religious environment initiated with that bill has contributed to an atmosphere of great fear and stigma for Ugandans who engage in same-sex relationships (including, but not exclusively, those who openly identify with the LGBTI community in Uganda). Furthermore, research in developed and developing countries has shown that such punitive laws actively undermine efforts to provide for the essential needs of these communities.

Ugandans have seen horrendous conflicts in the history of their remarkable country and within neighboring countries in recent years; conflicts that were fostered by political and religious leaders inciting social/ethnic divisions. “We stand with all fair and just-minded Ugandans in an outcry that LGBTI Ugandans will not become the next scapegoats. We demand that the Government of Uganda and the Police take swift and strong action to curb the growing homophobic climate in Kampala and around the country,” said ACT UP Philadelphia member Antonio Davis. In the letters, ACT UP Philadelphia amplified the calls led by SMUG in demanding that the Government of Uganda and the Police take the following specific actions:

1) Publicly and repeatedly condemn David’s murder;
2) Carry out a full and fair investigation into David’s murder with an assumption, until proved
otherwise, that David’s murder was motivated by homophobia and not routine or arbitrary
violence;
3) Investigate David’s hacked email account in the days preceding his death;
4) Prosecute the perpetrator(s) to the fullest extent of the law;
5) Communicate frequently with LGBT leaders throughout the investigation of David’s murder;
6) Ensure that members of Uganda’s LGBT community have adequate protection from violence;
7) Take prompt action against all threats or hate speech likely to incite violence, discrimination
or hostility toward LGBT Ugandans;
8) Eliminate any possibility of consideration or passage of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill.

Photos from Caroling

2010-12-22T19:34:00.003-05:00

The lyrics to our Xmas Carols!

2010-12-22T19:32:00.003-05:00

(more songs after the break)

We wish you a merry Xmas:

We wish you would fund AIDS housing
We wish you would fund AIDS housing
We wish you would fund AIDS housing
So we won't get sick.

It’s getting so very cold (3x)
So fund housing quick.

We won’t leave until there’s housing (3x)
who cares 'bout politics!

(repeat all, then...)

We wish you would fund AIDS housing (3x)
So we won’t get sick

We wish you would fund AIDS housing (3x)
So we can go home

O Christmas Tree

O Housing, O Housing
Will help us pre-vent HIV
O Housing, O Housing
Will help us pre-vent HIV

We are not trying to be funny
Cause Homes save lives and money

O Housing, O Housing,
Will help us tre-at HIV

O Housing, O Housing,
It i-s such a simple thing
O Housing, O Housing,
It i-s such a simple thing

Without homes, we may die
All we want is you to try

O Housing, O Housing
Will help us pre-vent HIV

O Housing, O Housing
Will help us tre-at HIV

Silent Night:

Hou-sing saves, money and lives
Roofs o’er heads, help one thrive
Shelters ma-ke us give up our meds
Force us to sle-ep on dir-ty beds
We need more ho-omes
We need more homes

Hou-sing is pre-vention
It’s a tool to lo’er infections
But the city does not fund our homes
It’s li-ke they left us alone
We need more ho-omes
We need more homes

Hou-sing is treatment
HIV we can defeat
If the Ma-a-yor is a friend
To coun-cil a budget he’ll send
More money for ho-omes
More money for homes

Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer:

Nutter, the Philly Mayor
Said to folks with HIV
Sorry that I can’t help you
But it’s not up to me

He said that the politics
Were too challenging to work
And all the homeless people
Thought he was a big ol’ jerk

Then one foggy Christmas week,
ACT UP came to say
Nutter, in your home so bright
Won’t you fund AIDS housing tonight

Then all the ACT UP members
Told the mayor their plea
We have a right to housing
We are gonna make you see

Frosty the Snowman

Nutter the Mayor
Has a cold and frosty soul
Though his shiny head and his black goatee
make him look so frickin’ cool

Nutter the Mayor
is a real smart guy they say
So we don’t know why
hundreds could die
while they wait for a home some day

There are 8000 people
With AIDS or HIV
Who need a home to stay alive
and be real healthy

But Nutter the Mayor
Thinks it’s all ok I s'pose
‘cause the budget’s done
and he spent none
On building folks more homes

Nutter the Mayor
Said fighting HIV
By funding homes
For all in need
Is not a priority

Nutter the Mayor
Says he has no change to spare
Though other towns
Don’t let people down
Philly won’t do its share

This is the mayor’s problem and he must make up a plan
but he won’t budge
unless we shove
and stick it to the man

Oh, Nutter the Mayor
Will hear our songs today
we’ll take the streets
and keep the beat
‘til he finds a way to pay

Thumpety thump thump
Thumpety thump thump
Look at ACT UP go!
Thumpety thump thump
Thumpety thump thump
Nutter can’t say no!

Santa Claus is Coming to Town

You better watch out
You better not cry
You better not pout
I'm telling you why
Activists are here at your house

We’re making a list
And checking it twice
Gonna find out if you’re
Naughty or nice
Activists want you to fund homes

You better watch out
You better not cry
You better not pout
I'm telling you why
Activists are here at your house

When sick people are sleeping
They need a home to stay
But you spent nothing on AIDS housing
So we are here to say...

Oh,

You better watch out
You better not cry
You better not pout
I'm telling you why
Activists are here at your house
…Activists are here at your house

The 12 days of Nutter

On the first day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
No money for AIDS hou-sing

On the second day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the third day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the fourth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS housing

On the fifth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the sixth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the seventh day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the eight day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Cold nights on the street
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the ninth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Rules for being sober
Cold nights on the street
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the tenth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
No beds to sleep on
Rules for being sober
Cold nights on the street
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hous-ing

On the eleventh day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Expensive city clinics
No beds to sleep on
Rules for being sober
Cold nights on the street
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

On the twelth day of Christmas,
The mayor gave to me
Lines for food and showers
Expensive city clinics
No beds to sleep on
Rules for being sober
Cold nights on the street
TB in the shelters
Less library hours
Years on waiting lists
ID requirements
Foreclosed homes
Shelters taking meds
And no money for AIDS hou-sing

AP: Thousands on HIV drugs desperate amid budget woes

2010-12-16T11:28:00.000-05:00

Cash-strapped states are cutting back on a program that provides free medicine to people with HIV, leaving thousands of patients to wonder where their drugs will come from and stirring fears of a return to the days when an AIDS diagnosis meant certain death.

At least 19 states have taken such steps as capping enrollment, dropping patients, instituting waiting lists, lowering the income ceiling for eligibility, and no longer covering certain drugs or tests.

The AIDS Drug Assistance Program is funded by the federal and state governments and run by the states. It provides free drugs in all 50 states and U.S. territories. But because people are living longer with HIV and the recession has created more demand for the program, states have been unable to keep up.

"It's very frustrating to be stuck in this position at this age and not feel well and be wondering if I am going to die any differently than the people who I helped die in the '80s," said Stephen Farrar, 55, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who has HIV and is going on Florida's waiting list. "Am I going to be one of those people?"

Health officials and advocates believe most people on ADAP's waiting lists are getting AIDS drugs free from pharmaceutical companies. But advocates say an unknown number are falling through the cracks of those programs, which provide only a patchwork of coverage and have widely varying income requirements.

AIDS drugs can be extremely expensive - a single one can cost more than $20,000 per year, and patients often need to take a cocktail of prescriptions to treat the disease or keep symptoms at bay.

In nine states, more than 4,500 people with HIV are on ADAP waiting lists or can't get into the program because enrollment is capped, according to the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors.

More than 300 people who had coverage were dropped this year, after five states lowered their income eligibility limits to as little as $21,000 per year. Hundreds more face the same fate by February if more states follow through on plans to cut their eligibility, the alliance said.

Several states have started covering fewer drugs - only AIDS medications, for example, but not drugs for conditions often developed by those treated for HIV.

The cutbacks have set off alarm among some HIV patients, with some people cutting pills in half to make them last longer, said Stephen Hourahan, executive director of AIDS Project Rhode Island, a state that was hit hard by the economic downturn and which instituted a waiting list this fall.

"There were stories of people calling us in a panic because they were afraid they were going to die if they didn't have their meds," he said.

Waiting lists have been instituted previously for the program, said Ann Lefert of the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors. But as demand has spiked, she said, the lists now are bigger than ever before.

The program had more than 168,000 people nationwide on its rolls in 2009, the most recent numbers available. The federal government spent $860 million on ADAP programs in the fiscal year that ends March 31, while states spent $336 million. In 2009, California, for example, spent $71 million, Texas $27 million and Illinois $14.5 million.

Nearly 1,400 people entered the program every month nationwide this year, compared with half that number in 2008, the alliance said. While many states have increased money sent to the program, it often hasn't been enough to keep up with demand, and they've had to cut services. Despite the greater need, 12 states have put less money into their drug programs.

Most people on ADAP don't qualify for Medicaid because they are not sick enough to be considered disabled. Some who do qualify can get only limited drug coverage; ADAP covers the gap.

Making sure patients with HIV take their medications faithfully is a high priority of health care workers because it reduces the chance they will develop resistance to drugs and may also lower the risk of transmission.

Farrar lost his health insurance this month, more than a year after losing his job doing hair and makeup at a Florida TV station. Once his final insurance-covered prescriptions run out, he will have to worry about filling 17 prescriptions - two AIDS drugs and the rest for related ailments, such as arthritis and wasting, a severe weight loss. He will be one of more than 2,400 patients on Florida's waiting list, which was started June 1.

The cuts hit even those with insurance because copays can reach $500 to $700 per month for a single drug, and ADAP often helps with those copays.

"This is a huge financial burden on folks, but there's not a whole lot we can do," said Kevin Sullivan, executive director of the Ohio AIDS Coalition. The state has more than 370 people on the waiting list and dropped more than 250 others from the program because of now-lower income limits.

The process for getting free drugs from pharmaceutical companies can be difficult to navigate because each has different rules, with some limiting patients' income to $21,000 per year and others covering patients who make up to $54,000.

Patients who take many drugs from different makers, like Farrar, have to qualify for multiple drug company programs. If they qualify for one but not another, they might have to change their drug regimen, which can affect their health.

Elaine Henderson, 39, of Cleveland, gets her single AIDS drug through a pharmaceutical company's free program but worries about what will happen if the company changes its requirements.

"Right now, I'm hoping that I'll be OK until ADAP is fixed. If not, then I'll be in trouble," she said.

During the summer, after several states instituted waiting lists, the federal government infused the program with $25 million, which helped some states eliminate waits. But that fell about $100 million short of what AIDS advocates estimated was needed, Lefert said. The House recently approved a $60 million increase for the year starting April 1, but it hasn't passed the Senate and would not solve the program's woes for the current fiscal year, Lefert said.

Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., said states must do their part to provide money, but given the economic slump, the federal government needs to step in and do more.

"Just to let people hang out there without any notion of where they're going to get their lifesaving treatments or drugs, it's really morally offensive," she said.

In the meantime, states are looking for ways to move money around in their budgets to cover ADAP.

Rhode Island was able to close its waiting list this month after finding money elsewhere in the budget. Florida's program, which has a deficit of $15 million to $17 million for the current fiscal year, hopes to do the same, but that probably would not happen until July.

But Sullivan, of the Ohio AIDS Coalition, said: "This is going to take a federal solution. To expect the states with their budget crises to bail this out is not realistic."

Farrar said he has written to his congressman and President Barack Obama about his plight.

"I'm in limbo. It's very stressful," he said. "I don't have much hope that it's getting any better."

Christmas Carol @ the Mayor's house!

2010-12-13T22:31:00.002-05:00

Nutter the Mayor is a real smart guy they say

So we don’t know why hundreds could die

while they wait for a home some day

There are 8000 people with AIDS or HIV

Who need a home to stay alive

and be real healthy

Join ACT UP Philadelphia in our on-going campaign to demand housing for all people with HIV, as we go Christmas Caroling at Mayor Nutter's House!

Wednesday, December 22nd @ 5pm
Meet in the McDonald’s parking lot at Golf & City Ave to walk to his house together
Free rides from LAVA - 4134 Lancaster - leaving at 4:45pm.

RSVP encouraged to actupp@critpath.org.

Inky Coverage of Housing Campaign

2010-12-12T12:11:00.001-05:00

Thanks to Penn Patient Allies for their work to get this published. Please go sign the consensus statement at www.housingistreatment.org.

Too long a wait for housing: Philadelphia needs to help those with HIV/AIDS.

Carlos Gonzalez was close to death when he arrived at Temple University Hospital in 2003. His case of AIDS was so advanced that his frail body was overrun by thrush, meningitis, and pneumonia. It had become painful for him to swallow and digest food and his weight had dropped to only 117 pounds. His desperate prognosis was made worse by the fact that he had no home. Recently released from prison, Carlos lived in a drug treatment recovery house in North Philadelphia. In a room he shared with 10 other men, Carlos was exposed to airborne infections that sent him to the hospital coughing uncontrollably almost every month.

Over the next few years, Carlos moved between homeless shelters and the streets. On lucky nights, friends - usually struggling themselves - took him in.

Carlos was too sick to work, and his minimal Social Security disability benefits weren't enough to pay for a room, food, and medical co-payments. Forced to forgo one basic necessity for another, Carlos continued to move in and out of shelters and hospital beds and frequently missed his medical treatments.

Carlos is not alone. Many people living with HIV face limited access to health services and housing in Philadelphia. Such conditions not only devastate the lives of people like Carlos, but they also threaten the well-being of our entire community. Philadelphia is already home to more than 19,000 people living with HIV, and our rate of new infections has grown to five times the national average.

In light of these statistics, Philadelphia must understand that subsidized housing for the poor who are HIV-positive is an effective and humanitarian means of treating AIDS and of preventing the spread of the disease.

Studies from around the country demonstrate that stably housed people with HIV are better able to take their lifesaving treatments regularly; suffer fewer life-threatening infections; and are less likely to engage in the unsafe behaviors that spread HIV. Subsidized housing for the sick also saves taxpayer dollars in other social services by decreasing the frequency of hospital admissions and shelter visits and by averting public expenditures on medications for newly infected individuals. Many other major cities across the country already supplement federal funding for housing for people with HIV and AIDS with municipal funds.

Philadelphia, however, devotes no direct city funding to housing people with HIV/AIDS. Instead we shortsightedly maintain a long waiting list that includes more than 130 individuals and families. In 2009 alone, at least six Philadelphians living with HIV/AIDS died while on the streets or in the shelter system.

We represent a group of 80 medical and public-health professionals who have authored a consensus statement on this crisis. The group includes experienced physicians such as Ellen Tedaldi, the director of Temple's comprehensive HIV program and the doctor who treated Carlos when he was first diagnosed.

We present the scientific documentation for the effectiveness of subsidized housing in HIV prevention and treatment and urge city government to recognize that providing housing for people living with HIV and AIDS is an essential public-health intervention (seewww.housingistreatment.org). Our city must house everyone on the waiting list and expand the reach of the federal housing program to include people before they become so sick that they are on the verge of very painful deaths. These small steps, which will cost the city approximately 0.1 percent of its current budget, are necessary components of any plan to effectively combat our alarming HIV epidemic.

Unlike too many others, Carlos Gonzalez was fortunate enough to see his condition improve. After two years on the waiting list, Carlos began receiving rental subsidies in early 2010. He now lives in a one-bedroom apartment in South Philadelphia. Because he is able to take all scheduled treatment doses, the HIV virus cannot be detected in his blood. As a result, his immune system is much stronger, and he no longer spends two weeks each year in a hospital bed.

Today, Carlos is a certified HIV counselor. He gives back to the community and provides hope to others going through the same struggles he successfully overcame. Because he knows that so many of the people he reaches out to on the streets will not survive the wait for housing, Carlos has become a tireless advocate. We stand with him in asking Mayor Nutter and City Council to end the waiting list for housing assistance for people living with HIV and AIDS.

Posted on Sun, Dec. 12, 2010

Philippe Bourgois is the Richard Perry University Professor of Anthropology and Family and Community Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

Amy Nunn is an assistant professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Brown University Medical School

E-mail the writers at bourgois@sas.upenn.edu and amy_nunn@brown.edu.

World AIDS Day Photos

2010-12-01T15:51:00.000-05:00

Take Action on World AIDS Day!

2010-12-01T10:31:00.000-05:00

Today is World AIDS Day. In the Washington Post today, former President Bush said:

"[P]rogress in many African nations depends on the realistic hope of new patients gaining access to treatment. Why get tested if AIDS drugs are restricted to current patients? On AIDS, to stand still is to lose ground."

As strange as it feels, I can't help but agree with the former President. What a fitting comment for this World AIDS Day, three years after President Obama made a commitment to dramatically increase spending on global AIDS. Instead, funding has virtually flat-lined for two years in a row. The result on the ground is that people are being turned away from clinics without life-saving medicine. New research on prevention is stalling because of a lack of funding. And the doctors and nurses needed to implement the programs are not getting trained, because the money isn't there to train them.

So today, people from around the US are coming together to call for increased funding for AIDS, which the President and Congress promised to do. Will you join them? Directions are below.

President Obama will finalize his budget by December 15th so time is of the essence.

To make a difference:

On December 1st, call the White House Comment Line at (202)456-1111
Follow the automated instructions
Say: “Hi, my name is ________. I’m from ______. I’m disappointed with how the administration has dealt with the AIDS Pandemic so far. I’m calling to ask President Obama to live up to his promise of contributing $50 billion by 2013 for the fight against AIDS. Thank you very much."

NY Times covers resurgence of student AIDS activism

2010-11-30T19:12:00.000-05:00

A New Breed of AIDS Activists Dogs Obama
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

NEW HAVEN — David Carel was never a rabble-rouser. But amid the clutter of his dorm room at Yale University, Mr. Carel, baby-faced and slight-shouldered at 19, keeps evidence of his new life as an AIDS activist: posters, banners and the flier demanding “$50 bn for Global AIDS” that he concealed in his fleece jacket one Saturday in late October when, heart pounding, he sneaked past security into a Democratic campaign rally in Bridgeport.

He used the flier to do something he “never would have imagined”: heckle the president of the United States.

Cameron Nutt, a medical anthropology student at Dartmouth, says he backs President Obama “100 percent.” But, incensed over the president’s “failure to remain true” to a campaign promise to spend $50 billion over five years fighting the AIDS epidemic overseas, Mr. Nutt disrupted Mr. Obama this fall at a Boston rally. His co-protesters included Luke Messac, a University of Pennsylvania medical student and a field organizer for Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign, and Krishna Prabhu, a Harvard University senior who caucused for Mr. Obama in Iowa in 2008 — and rescheduled his final exam in global health to attend the president’s inauguration.

“The promise has not been fulfilled,” Mr. Prabhu said, sounding more disappointed than angry.

Roughly a quarter-century after gay men rose up to demand better access to H.I.V. medicines, a new breed of AIDS advocate is growing up on college campuses. Unlike the first generation of patient-activists, this latest crop is composed of budding public health scholars. They are mostly heterosexual. Rare is the one who has lost friends or family members to the disease. Rather, studying under some of the world’s most prominent health intellectuals, they have witnessed the epidemic’s toll during summers or semesters abroad, in AIDS-ravaged nations like Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.

College activism, and AIDS activism in particular, is nothing new. On Wednesday, World AIDS Day, students across the nation will participate in speeches, fund-raisers and the like. But a loose-knit band of about two dozen Ivy Leaguers, mostly from Harvard and Yale, is using more confrontational tactics, as well as some high-powered connections, to wangle encounters with top White House officials in a determined, and seemingly successful, effort to get under Mr. Obama’s skin.

Their protests — which have drawn a sharp rebuke from the president (not to mention some disapproving parents) — come as many in the AIDS advocacy community are wondering aloud whether Mr. Obama is as devoted to their cause as his immediate predecessor, George W. Bush. In 2003, Mr. Bush began vastly increasing spending on life-saving antiretroviral medicines for AIDS patients in impoverished nations; the number receiving the drugs has shot up from 50,000 to more than five million today. Yet the World Health Organization says as many as 10 million lack needed therapy.

While spending on global AIDS has gone up on Mr. Obama’s watch, and the United States remains the world’s largest contributor to such programs, independent analysts say that the rate of increase has slowed significantly and that it will be difficult for the president to keep his $50 billion pledge — or even meet a lesser goal, set in 2008 by Congress, of $48 billion for AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria by 2013. The task may grow even harder under a new Congress, with the incoming House Republican majority intent on cutting spending and Tea Party-backed Republicans in both chambers expressing skepticism about all types of foreign aid.

Still, armed with data from Health Gap, an AIDS advocacy group, the students are determined to hold Mr. Obama to his word. When Ezekiel Emanuel, a bioethicist and health adviser to the president (and brother of the former White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel) spoke at Yale two weeks ago, he wound up sparring with Mr. Carel at a fruit-and-cereal breakfast at the campus Hillel House, a meal arranged by a fellow Yale student, Dr. Emanuel’s daughter. Later that day, Mr. Carel led a demonstration outside Dr. Emanuel’s talk, which ended with students chanting at the adviser as they followed him down the street.

When Eric Goosby, Mr. Obama’s global AIDS coordinator, traveled to Boston in November for a panel discussion with Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, he was collared at a cocktail party by Mr. Prabhu, the Harvard senior. Mr. Prabhu arrived with another panelist: his professor, Dr. Paul E. Farmer, founder of the global nonprofit Partners in Health.

“These students are my retirement plan,” Dr. Farmer said in a telephone interview from Haiti, where he is treating cholera patients. “A lot of them are doing much more than going to protests; they’re writing papers and articles, they’re doing graduate studies.”

Mr. Messac, the University of Pennsylvania medical student, explored the origins of Mr. Bush’s AIDS program in a 120-page paper, “Lazarus at America’s Doorstep,” for his Harvard undergraduate thesis. Mr. Carel, who spent last summer working at a hospital in the rural South African village of Tugela Ferry, now studies Zulu and persuaded a visiting professor from South Africa to let him take her upper-level course on “the political economy of AIDS.” (He had to skip Zulu class for the Emanuel protest; he said his professor understood.)

The students have also befriended a longtime veteran of the AIDS wars, Gregg Gonsalves, who at 47 is completing his undergraduate degree on a full scholarship at Yale. Mr. Gonsalves often lectures public-health classes on what he calls “ancient history” — the work of groups like Act Up in the 1990s.

“Theirs is not a first-person commitment, in the sense that none of them is living with H.I.V.,” Mr. Gonsalves said of the new AIDS protesters. “It’s all based out of a sense of solidarity and social justice. I used to wonder where the next generation would come from. They’re here.”

Inside the White House, Dr. Emanuel, for one, is not impressed. He says the students are serving up tired arguments about dollar amounts that ignore the Obama administration’s emphasis on spending money more efficiently and offering services, like circumcision, that can reduce the spread of H.I.V. While Mr. Bush emphasized AIDS and malaria, Mr. Obama is promoting a six-year, $63 billion “global health initiative” that seeks to address a range of diseases, with emphasis on women and children.

“To be honest, and this is no put-down to the sincerity of the students, I didn’t hear a new argument that I haven’t heard for months,” Dr. Emanuel said in an interview after his breakfast with Mr. Carel. “I’ve not seen a blog post on the number of people we have circumcised, or the number of mothers we treat in maternal-child health. Those are real performance measures.”

Dr. Emanuel would not discuss any conversations with the president about the students, but Mr. Obama’s reaction when he was disrupted in October at the rally in Bridgeport made clear he was irked. “You’ve been appearing at every rally we’ve been doing,” the president complained, telling them it was not “a useful strategy.”

The students were pleased that he addressed them directly, but their heckling prompted even some fellow AIDS activists to take issue with their tactics. Regan Hofmann, editor in chief of Poz, a magazine for people affected with H.I.V., questioned the wisdom of disrupting the president on the eve of a critical election for Democrats.

Mr. Carel says he and his fellow protesters thought long and hard about that. It was his first demonstration; his parents told him they wished he would be “more respectful.” His friends were shocked. Still, he says it was worth it.

“There are very few ways we could have any access to him,” he explained. “This was a way to get Obama’s ear.”

AIDS Risk Greatly Lowered by Daily Pill, Study Finds

2010-11-23T09:38:00.004-05:00

NYTimes.com: "In a development that could change the battle against AIDS, researchers have found that taking a daily antiretroviral pill greatly lowers the chances of getting infected with the fatal virus.

"In the study, published Tuesday by the New England Journal of Medicine [full text], researchers found that the hundreds of gay men randomly assigned to take the drugs were 44 percent less likely to get infected than the equal number assigned to take a placebo.

"But when only the men whose blood tests showed they had taken their pill faithfully every day were considered, the pill was more than 90 percent effective, said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, head of the division of the National Institutes of Health, which paid for the study along with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

"'That’s huge,' Dr. Fauci said. 'That says it all for me.'

"The large study, nicknamed iPrEx, included nearly 2,500 men in six countries and was coordinated by the Gladstone Institutes of the University of California, San Francisco.

"The results are the best news in the AIDS field in years, even better than this summer’s revelation that a vaginal microbicide protected 39 percent of all the women testing it and 54 percent of those who used it faithfully.

"Also, the antiretroviral pill — Truvada, a combination of two drugs, tenofovir and emtricitabine — is available by prescription in many countries right now, while the microbicide gel is made only in small amounts for clinical trials. ...

"Because Truvada is available now, some clinicians already prescribe it for prophylaxis, Dr. Fauci said, but whether doing so becomes official policy will depend on discussions by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, medical societies and others, which could take months."

Comment, JSJ: Of course this should be prescribed -- at least for men who need it and want it to reduce their risk of getting infected with HIV.

Free buses to DC for World AIDS Day

2010-11-23T09:16:00.001-05:00

ON WORLD AIDS DAY, WILL YOU SIMPLY MOURN THE DEAD?

…OR WILL YOU FIGHT LIKE HELL FOR THE LIVING, TOO?

Join ACT UP and our allies in DC on World AIDS Day (December 1st) as we call on President obama to keep the promise he made to ensure everyone with HIV has access to treatment.

Wednesday, December 1st
Free buses leave from Broad & Walnut at 7:30am.
Lunch will be provided, and tokens will be available for those who need them.
RSVP not required, but encouraged, to actupphilly@gmail.com or 215-386-1981
More info: actupphilly.org

PLEASE WEAR BLACK!

Why? There are over 4,000 people with HIV in the US who are forced onto waiting lists for AIDS drugs. Countless others can’t even get on the waiting list, because the are too “rich” or because their insurance companies are denying them care. Around the world, 10 million people were promised medication, but they do not have access. All of these people will die unless President Obama keeps his promise to fund AIDS treatment at home and abroad.

ACT UP demands homes, not excuses!

2010-11-10T18:37:00.002-05:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | 11/10/10

“PEOPLE WITH AIDS NEED HOMES, NOT EXCUSES”

MAYOR NUTTER CLAIMS HE “CAN’T COMMIT” TO ACT UP’S PLAN TO “SAVE LIVES, SAVE MONEY” BY ENDING AIDS HOUSING WAIT LIST; AIDS ACTIVISTS DIE-IN TO PROTEST MAYOR’S INACTION

Philadelphia – Members of AIDS activist groups ACT UP Philadelphia and Proyecto Sol, along with graduate students in the University of Pennsylvania’s Urban Studies Program and medical school, met with Mayor Michael Nutter on Monday. The students and activists shared the results of a research and planning process and asked the mayor to commit to spending two to four million dollars to create permanent housing to end the two-year long waiting list for housing for people with AIDS in Philadelphia.

ACT UP Members Carla Fields, Cliff Williams, and Carlos Gonzales (along with six other ACT UP members) shared personal testimony of the dangers of living on the streets and in shelters with a compromised immune system. All three had experienced stigma, dangerous diseases, fleas and bedbugs (which are especially dangerous for people living with HIV), poor nutrition and lack of access to medication while in the city shelter system. Mr. Williams, whose wife passed away from HIV and cancer while on the AIDS housing wait list, pointed out that because shelters are the only options for people with AIDS who need homes, and there are no city shelters for families, he and his wife had to stay on opposite sides of the city while she was dying. Ms. Fields, who volunteers regularly in Philadelphia’s tent cities, and is homeless herself, testified that her experience was not unique. “I’m not doing this for myself. I’m doing this for all my brothers and sisters who are dying and need homes.” Mr. Gonzales added that without the housing he eventually received, he would not be alive today. “Being in a home meant I could take my medicine, get good nutrition, and become a productive member of society.”

Urban Design students Jonathan Snyder and Phil Dawson and Professor Michael Nairn then shared the preliminary results of the research they have done into housing models, costs, and ways for the city to fund housing for people with AIDS while reducing long-term costs. They shared that a “housing first” model, which provides stable, permanent housing without requiring long shelter stays and transitional housing (the “continuum of care” model currently emphasized in Philadelphia for people with HIV/AIDS), has saved other comparable cities $88,000 per client per year, when compared with the “continuum of care” model. In addition, the housing first model means that families like Mr. Williams would not have to spend years shuttling back and forth between mens’ and womens’ shelters, and people like Ms. Fields would not be forced to live in shelter systems that were actively making them sick through contagious diseases and insect infestations.

Penn medical students Roland Li and Luke Messac then shared a consensus statement signed by 75 Philadelphia-area medical professionals, supporting the immediate adoption of a housing first model for people with HIV/AIDS in Philadelphia, ending the waiting list for AIDS housing, and expanding Philadelphia’s capacity to provide homes for people living with HIV.

Mayor Nutter took detailed notes on each participant’s statement. Promising to review their documents and his notes, he continued, “I can’t commit to anything right now.” He explained that funding for the fiscal year 2012 was uncertain, and said, “I don’t want to make this a political conversation, but I live in a political world… A lot changed [on election day, November 2].” Ms. Fields expressed disappointment and frustration that while he apologized to her personally for her experience in Philadelphia’s shelter system, that he was unwilling to solve the problem for everyone on the waiting list.

ACT UP’s analysis of the city’s budget shows that the prison and court systems are massive drains on city resources. On top of that, millions are spent to put people into what ACT UP member Cliff Williams describes as “shelter warehouses”. ACT UP member Max Ray added, “We know that providing homes saves lives and saves money, keeps people out of jail and out of chronic homelessness. Why spend money to warehouse people in prisons and shelters, when for less money we could house them in permanent homes?”

On Wednesday, AIDS activists, angered by the Mayor’s refusal to provide safe, stable housing to people with AIDS, to save lives and save the city money over time, gathered at City Hall to memorialize those for whom housing comes to late, and remind the mayor of the 8000 HIV-positive Philadelphians with unmet housing needs. “People with AIDS need homes, not excuses,” proclaimed ACT UP and Proyecto Sol member Jose De Marco, before leading the activists in a die-in in front of the City Hall entrance. Chalk outlines of their bodies will remain outside the Juniper entrance until it rains, a reminder to the mayor of the anger and disappointment he faced at Monday night’s meeting.

###

Photos from ACT UP's meeting w/ Mayor Nutter

2010-11-09T17:59:00.003-05:00

Will we see you tomorrow, noon on the east side of City Hall? Mayor Nutter said he couldn't commit to funding housing for people with AIDS. We need to show him the consequences of not acting!

EU deal threatens HIV drug supplies

2010-11-07T17:36:00.002-05:00

Al Jazeera English: "The charity Medicins sans Frontieres (MSF) says that hidden clauses in the free trade agreeement (FTA) currently being negotiated between Europe and India will prevent the manufacture and distribution of crucial generic medicines produced in the country.

"There are dirty legal tricks being used," says Dr. Tido von Schoenangerer, who runs the MSF campaign for essential medicines. "Any person living with HIV in the developing world is facing a future scenario in which the medicines they need will be under threat."

"Meanwhile the World Health Organisation, the UN's public health body, has echoed MSF's concerns, saying that if the trade deal does indeed include clauses governing the production of cheap generic medicines, the ramifications for the public health could be serious.

"The issue hinges on a so-called 'data exclusivity' provision in the free trade agreement, which campaigners say would effectively copyright information gathered in the clinical trials that prove the effectiveness and safety of medicines.

"At present, generic manufacturers rely on the results of the original clinical trials carried out by the drug developer to get their cheap version registered. If this information were to become exclusive, Indian companies would be left without the data they need to register their drugs.

"It means companies will have to repeat the trials, which not only would be very costly, but raises ethical issues because it is basically doing research to find out something that is already known," says von Schoenangerer. ...

"The department of essential medicines of WHO has never been given a copy of the draft of the free trade agreement..."

UPDATE: Why Rachel Maddow loves ACT UP Philly (and why you should too)

2010-11-07T13:19:00.005-05:00

Remember a couple weeks ago when ACT UP received a Dr. Alan Berkman Global Health Justice Award? And we said we would try to get a copy of Rachel Maddow's remarks. Well, we got 'em! Here's what she had to say...

Changing the world takes brilliant, clear thinkers. It takes commitment. And it takes the ability to *mobilize* other people to change the world with you.

For decades, ACT UP Philadelphia has been mobilizing people living with AIDS to take to the streets. They have organized countless marches and protests and rallies and their actions have saved countless numbers of lives. And they have won. They have successfully pressured the US Government to create PEPFAR; their demonstrations led DIRECTLY to all 2008 Democratic Presidential candidates committing to funding the fight against global AIDS at $50 billion over 5 years (an increase from President Bush's thirty billion). They are the grassroots of the Global AIDS Movement but they are also an incredibly inspiring organization. Completely volunteer run, meeting weekly for decades with no money, constantly recruiting new members, constantly changing with the times, always run by low-income people of color living with AIDS. I would hold up the ACT UP PHILLY ratio of resources to results ... against any big, full-of-itself organization, anywhere in the world. If Congress worked as efficiently and with as much commitment as ACT UP Philly, AIDS would be cured, cars would run on air, and corporations would actually pay taxes.

I was an ACT UP Philly gadfly in my activist days, and I never learned more anywhere else, about the activist math of combining desperation with commitment with leverage with integrity with chutzpah with humility... for results.

We owe them a lot more than this award -- but this award is something they richly deserve. On behalf of Health Gap, I'm proud to present the first-ever Dr. Alan Berkman Global Health Justice Award -- to ACT UP Philadelphia.

Nov 10th @ Noon: Join ACT UP to memorialize people with AIDS who've died on the streets

2010-10-25T13:15:00.001-04:00

Take Action!

11/10/10 @ Noon

City Hall East Side

Demand housing for all people with HIV

Read more about our housing campaign here.

ACT UP receives Dr. Alan Berkman Award

2010-10-25T12:00:00.001-04:00

ACT UP received the Dr. Alan Berkman Global Health Justice Award from Health GAP on Saturday, October 23rd. Dr. Berkman was a radical physician and activist who spent his whole life advancing justice for people around the world.

The award was presented to us by Rachel Maddow, TV show host extraordinaire and former ACT UP Philly "gadfly" (her words!).

Left to right: ACT UP members Sam Sitrin, Max Ray, Asia Russell

Hannah Zellman, Kaytee Riek, Jose De Marco, Rachel Maddow

and Tiffany Thompson.

We are trying to get a copy of her speech. She said such nice things about us!

Diabetes Care Misses Mark in HIV Patients - in Meeting Coverage

2010-10-25T10:22:00.000-04:00

IDSA from MedPage Today: "In scrutinizing how well different types of doctors did in providing routine care, researchers found that only doctors at a Canadian endocrinology clinic came anywhere near meeting treatment benchmarks.

"For example, when it came to foot examinations -- a key part of diabetes surveillance -- the check was done less than 20% of the time at a Toronto immunodeficiency clinic and an American HIV clinic; about 35% of the time at an American primary care clinic; about 65% of the time at an American endocrinology clinic, and about 90% of the time at the Canadian endocrinology clinic."

ACT UP Halloween Party!

2010-10-15T10:44:00.000-04:00

Click here to RSVP and invite your friends on Facebook

Can't make it? Donate to ACT UP and show your love!

Flu shot linked to reduced heart attack risk

2010-09-20T19:40:00.000-04:00

Reuters: "Middle-aged and older adults who get the flu vaccine may be less likely to suffer a first-time heart attack in the following year than those who skip the shot, according to a study published Monday."

Tell President Obama that Waiting Lists Won't End AIDS: Access to Treatment Will!

2010-09-19T17:47:00.003-04:00

President Obama will be in town tomorrow (Monday, October 20th) and ACT UP Philly will be lining the streets outside the convention center to help him see the impact of not keeping his AIDS promises: growing waiting lists for housing in Philly, for medicine in the US and around the world.

Join us Monday, September 20th, and 2pm at the corner of Broad St. and Arch St.

Max

aidsmap.com :: English - Many HIV-positive gay men have post-traumatic stress disorder

2010-09-01T04:53:00.000-04:00

aidsmap.com :: English - Many HIV-positive gay men have post-traumatic stress disorder: "A third of HIV-positive gay men have post-traumatic stress disorder, UK investigators report in AIDS Patient Care and STDs. Events including starting treatment, HIV-related illness, and witnessing an HIV-related death were all linked to the development of symptoms associated with post-traumatic stress disorder. Emotional responses to such events - rather than actual physical threat - were associated with the development of symptoms of posttraumatic stress."

Letter to the Editor submitted today

2010-08-31T20:22:00.004-04:00

Did you see this article about Philadelphia Housing Authority director Carl Greene? ACT UP Philly did, and we were pissed. Check out the letter to the editor we submitted to the Inquirer today:

Dear Editor,

Last night, the Inquirer's article, "At PHA: Humiliation, groping, banishment," was passed around ACT UP Philadelphia's meeting. Members include people currently living in PHA housing, people on PHA waitlists, and people currently homeless. Everyone in the group was outraged at the story. But our outrage was not directed at Carl Greene's failures. Our outrage was directed at the assumption, perpetuated in the article, that public housing projects can only be dangerous, dirty places to live.

The article referred to two situations in which employees were forced to work in the PHA projects, suggesting that the conditions in the projects were unacceptable for employees. But if the conditions are so bad for the employees who only work there eight hours a day, then what about the people, especially people with AIDS, who actually live there?

Carl Greene's failure is part of a larger failure in Philadelphia: we turn a blind eye to the conditions in our public housing, our shelters, and our streets. Mayor Nutter presides over an expanding waitlist for homes for people with AIDS, a crumbling public housing infrastructure, and an inept housing authority. It is time he step up and start solving the housing crisis in Philadelphia.

Sincerely,
ACT UP Philly

2010-07-18T18:39:00.001-04:00

Vienna AIDS Conference News
Via Twitter:

#AIDS2010 whole conference
#AIDSCURE cure research
#VDECL drug policy, ViennaDeclaration.com
#GYCA youth, gyca.org
#VYF Vienna Youth Force

Other news sites:

Scientists Make Immune Cells in Mice That Fight Off HIV

2010-07-02T23:00:00.001-04:00

Business Week: "'It's a one-shot treatment if it works,' noted study co-author Paula Cannon, associate professor of molecular microbiology at the University of Southern California."

Comment: The Berlin mouse? No radiation or chemotherapy needed.

Technical abstract:
http://www.nature.com/nbt/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nbt.1663.html

Medical Marijuana in HIV/AIDS – Part 2: Science Is Mostly Positive On Medical Marijuana For People With HIV

2010-07-02T01:11:00.001-04:00

The AIDS Beacon: "Kris Hermes, Media Specialist for Americans for Safe Access (ASA), an organization that promotes legalization of medical marijuana, told The AIDS Beacon in an interview that there are a variety of reasons people with HIV use medical marijuana.

“One main reason is relief of side effects from antiretroviral therapy,” said Hermes, “which can make patients better at taking their medications.”

“Many users also say it helps reduce symptoms from other illnesses, such as hepatitis C, that are common in people with HIV,” he added."

Press Coverage of Housing Action

2010-07-01T09:28:00.006-04:00

So far, we've found a bit of coverage of our action yesterday. But we know more is out there! So if you come across anything, please let us know in the comments.

Activists ask Philadelphia to expand subsidized for AIDS patients (Inquirer)

Is the city wasting money by not spending more on housing for people with AIDS? (City Paper)

AIDS Activists Press Philadelphia on Housing (NPR)

Photos from today's action

2010-06-30T18:46:00.003-04:00

ACT UP report released! Dying for Homes: How Mayor Nutter is wasting city money and failing people with AIDS

2010-06-30T17:53:00.002-04:00

Hot off the presses! Download it here.

Summary:

Providing supportive housing for people living with AIDS, regardless of substance abuse or mental illness, is a cost-effective, life-saving program. The Mayor has instead chosen to spend our money on unsafe, unsustainable shelter systems, on emergency room visits, and in the case of at least eight Philadelphians in the past eighteen months, funerals. Access to safe, permanent housing is a vital component of HIV/AIDS treatment and care. By relying on the shelter system instead of funding a functional supporting housing program for people with AIDS, the mayor has failed on HIV treatment and HIV prevention.

Economy Wreaks Havoc on Federal AIDS Drug Program - NYTimes.com June 30, 2010

2010-06-30T17:52:00.001-04:00

NYTimes.com: "The weak economy is ravaging the government program that provides life-sustaining antiretroviral drugs to people with H.I.V. or AIDS who cannot afford them. Nearly 1,800 have been relegated to rapidly expanding waiting lists that less than three years ago had dwindled to zero.
Enlarge This Image

Michael McElroy for The New York Times

As with other safety-net programs, ballooning demand caused by persistent unemployment and loss of health insurance is being met with reductions in government resources. Without reliable access to the medications, which cost individuals in the AIDS Drug Assistance Program an average of $12,000 a year, people with H.I.V. are more likely to develop full-blown AIDS, transmit the virus and require expensive hospitalizations."

Today at City Hall

2010-06-30T15:42:00.001-04:00

None of my photos shows the whole demo.

John

Today: Tell Nutter to end the AIDS housing waiting list

2010-06-30T05:51:00.003-04:00

Please come join ACT UPtoday, Wednesday June 30th, to participate in a crucial demonstration as we tell Mayor Nutter that he is FAILING people with AIDS who are in desperate need of housing.

WHAT: ACT UP press conference and demonstration to demand city funding for housing for people with AIDS, including presenting the Mayor with a failing report and report card.

WHEN: TODAY, June 30th at 1pm

WHERE: West side entrance of City Hall

WHY: Because there are over 200 individuals/families in Philadelphia on the City's AIDS housing wait list (with hundreds and thousands more trying to get on the list) who each are waiting at least 2 years on the list. And while people with AIDS are literally DYING on the list waiting for housing, the City gives ZERO dollars to decrease and end this list. Housing is clearly one of the most overlooked needs for people with AIDS in Philadelphia, and our City and the Mayor is doing next to nothing about it.

So we need to let Mayor Nutter know that he is failing on HIV treatment and prevention, and wasting city money by funding shelters instead of real housing for people with AIDS.ACT UPand people with HIV and AIDS in Philadelphia need your support!

We hope to see you there.

Love,

ACT UP

Medical Marijuana In HIV/AIDS – Part 1: Legal Support For Medical Marijuana Use Gains Steam

2010-06-30T05:45:00.000-04:00

The AIDS Beacon

"Legal support for the use of medical marijuana, including by people with HIV/AIDS, has been a growing trend nationwide. Laws are not uniform and have often been the source of contentious debate; however, an increasing number of states have passed or are considering laws to legalize the drug for medical purposes.

"The most recent advance on the medical marijuana front is in Washington, D.C., whose city council voted last month in favor of legislation to legalize medical marijuana in the district. The bill will allow access to the drug for those with serious illnesses, including HIV infection.

"Mayor Adrian Fenty signed the bill on May 21, sending it to Congress for a mandatory review period (expected to end July 23) before becoming law."

Take Action at the US Social Forum!

2010-06-24T09:48:00.002-04:00

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Thursday, June 24, 2010

9:00 p.m.

2010 USSF Forum

COBO Hall, Plenary Session

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

AIDS ACTIVIST PEOPLE'S MOVEMENT ASSEMBLY DIES IN FRONT OF THE GLOBAL ECONOMY PLENARY SESSION AT THE USSF

AIDS is still a crisis from Detroit to Dakar

Detroit, MI: People living with HIV/AIDS, Health GAP, ACT-UP Philadelphia, Philadelphia Global AIDS Watch Dogs (G A W D), NYC AIDS Housing Network/VOCAL, Gender JUST, Youth United For Change and other supporters will hold a die in at the 2010 United States Social Forum (USSF).

There are currently 33 million people living with HIV around the world, of that number about 13 million need immediate access to lifesaving AIDS medications in order to survive. Yet, less than 4 million people around the world have access to AIDS treatment. Recent studies have shown that access to HIV treatment is 93% effective in preventing the spread of HIV.

However, the United States and other wealthy countries have dramatically reduced their commitments to providing funding for universal access to treatment-despite global promises. The protest will happen on the week before the G20 meeting in Canada.

The global AIDS movement was born out of the civil rights movement of the late 1960's, the DE-institutionalization movement and gay liberation movement of the 1970's and the anti-apartheid movement of the 1980's. With the very direct root causes of AIDS-poverty, racism and homophobia- driving the epidemic, AIDS activists easily work across issue areas to survive. However, the USSF has illustrated how marginalized AIDS organizing remains even among the most progressive groups in the country. At the World Social Forum in Dakar in February of 2011, African activists will highlight how the AIDS crisis has ravaged their communities. It is necessary for those of us in the United States to get involved in the fight against global AIDS.

The AIDS Activist People's Movement Assembly is holding a die-in at the global economy plenary to increase visibility to this cross cutting issue. “If you are working on immigrant rights, you are fighting for people living with AIDS who come to the United States seeking

treatment. If you are working on housing rights, you are fighting for people with AIDS who die needlessly on the streets and in substandard shelters. If you are working on fighting global corporate power, you are fighting along side people living with AIDS who face powerful corporations who would rather see millions of people die, then relinquish a small portion of their enormous profits.”, said Yetta Smith, a member of ACT UP Philadelphia and a graduate of Health GAP's IMPACT project.

“AIDS needs to be addressed by all of us at this conference. It is not the sole responsibility of people living with AIDS to carry the burden of this fight for survival. We all must join the struggle.” said Charles Long of the NYC AIDS Housing Network/VOCAL.

The AIDS activists are asking USSF participants to join them for a condom conga line at the Leftist Lounge on Friday night to show support for the AIDS movement and to sign a petition calling for full funding for the global AIDS fight to President Obama.

For more information, go to www.takeanumber.org, actupphilly.org or nycahn.org!

Sign Petitions to Support AIDS Housing and HIV Prevention in Philly!

2010-06-14T14:28:00.002-04:00

Take a short moment and go to the following links to sign two important petitions started by ACT UP Philly members on change.org:

HIV Prevention: http://healthcare.change.org/petitions/view/we_demand_hiv_prevention_funding_for_philadelphia

AIDS Housing: http://homelessness.change.org/petitions/view/housing_is_prevention_health_care_and_supports_wellbeing

Where Will the Money Come From?

2010-06-10T14:39:00.032-04:00

Here's one place: http://costofwar.com/

Whenever we tell people in power what we need to fight the AIDS epidemic (whether it be medication, housing, culturally appropriate prevention, etc) we're always told, "Where will the money come from?"

Each million dollars buys about 4 minutes of these wars, which make us much less safe, not more. $15 million dollars an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And these counters don't yet even include the "surge" (as of June 2010) -- let alone taking care of U.S. casualties for the rest of their lives.

Yet there's been a mostly successful campaign to take the wars "off the table" from budget discussions, as if the wars were God-given, not Bush-given. That's because hundreds of billions of dollars buys a lot of influence to keep the money train going.

JSJ

PS: We also need the "currency transaction levy (CTL). Essentially, it's a tiny tax on currency that's traded by big banks. This insignificant tax would raise $33 billion a year, and wouldn't impact the market." See A Tiny Tax on the Big Banks, Huge Change for the World.

New video by ACT UP member Yetta

2010-06-09T11:59:00.000-04:00

yetta act up video from jay smith on Vimeo.

Love ACT UP? Please help

2010-06-09T10:09:00.001-04:00

Dear Friend of ACT UP -

We know you love ACT UP Philadelphia. We've been here for 23 years, standing up for people with HIV in Philadelphia and around the world. We've won amazing victories by organizing people with HIV to fight back and demand the life-saving programs and medicine we need. We have never accepted a dime from drug companies or the government because we know it would influence our advocacy. We take on campaigns that other organizations can't because of funding restrictions. Right now, we're working on three major campaigns to increase access to services for people living with and at risk of HIV. For more information on our campaigns, please read at the bottom of the email.

The bottom line is that right now, we are in a bind. Our largest funder has had to delay grant cycles by a few months and we have next to no money in the bank. Please make a donation to help us get through this tough period so that we may keep the lights on and the powerful organizing going. You can make your donation easily online through our website - actupphilly.org - by clicking on the paypal link. Or, you can mail a check to ACT UP Philadelphia, PO Box 22439, Land Title Station, Philadelphia, PA 19110.

Your donation matters! We have a lot going on in the next few months. We're hoping to send a delegation to the US Social Forum, to network and learn from other brilliant activists from across the US. We are planning a major action to tell our Mayor that the city must end the 183 person AIDS housing waiting list.

In addition, we are reaching out to new people and growing our group. Our meeting size has nearly doubled in the last year. Many of our new members are low-income and they need tokens to get to meetings. We like to provide a light dinner so people can make it through our weekly meetings without getting hungry.

All of these things cost money - money we simply don't have right now. Please, reach into your pockets and donate to us. We wouldn't ask, except that it's a crisis now. We will not be able to do the things we need to do unless we raise $1000 by the end of June. If your organization can donate, we can send you an invoice. Email actupphilly@gmail.com if you need one.

What your donation will support:

- $30 - food for a meeting with 25 members

- $50 - tokens for two meetings

- $100 - copies, signs, and fabulous props for our upcoming housing action

- $120 - travel for members of ACT UP to attend the US Social Forum

- $200 - a bus full of 57 people to attend our upcoming housing action

- $500 - all of the above, or our basic operating expenses (office rent, meeting space, phone, internet) for the next two months

Thank you for your continued support of ACT UP Philadelphia. We love you!

Roy Hayes, Kate Kozeniewski, Hannah Zellman, Jose De Marco, Waheedah Shabazz-el, Eddie Lowry, Erica Goldberg, Kaytee Riek, Asia Russell, John Barbieri, Max Ray, Paul Yabor, Paul Davis and Jen Cohn, on behalf of all of ACT UP's members

Current ACT UP campaigns:

1. Locally, we are working to end the AIDS housing waiting list. The city of Philadelphia spends no money on AIDS housing. 183 are officially on the waiting list, but the process to get on the list is so bureaucratic and complicated that there are likely hundreds more who need housing and can't get it. We've made strides, getting the city to start talking about AIDS housing. We know that council members and the Health Commissioner are talking about this, but it hasn't made it to the Mayor's desk. Our action in two weeks will make sure that the Mayor hears about this life-threatening issue.

2. State-wide, the Governor announced a $2 million cut to HIV prevention funding, in the middle of a fiscal year. This cut may be increased for next year, as the state is facing a major budget crisis. 2 weeks ago, ACT UP mobilized 200 people to protest the Governor's cuts. We are continuing our advocacy, and working with media and allies to make sure this critical issue gets resolved.

3. Nationally, ACT UP is working with other organizations to pressure the US government to keep it's promise to fund global AIDS programs. Because the US has not kept its promise, thousands of people worldwide who were promised medication are being forced onto waiting lists for AIDS treatment. They will die unless the US keeps its promise. In May, we mobilized four buses (200 people!) to travel to NYC to participate in a demonstration outside an Obama fundraiser, to hold our leaders accountable to the promises they made to us.

AIDSmeds.com - Top Stories : Myriad Genetics Suspends Its HIV Maturation Inhibitor Program

2010-06-09T02:29:00.000-04:00

AIDSmeds.com - Top Stories : Myriad Genetics Suspends Its HIV Maturation Inhibitor Program: "Myriad Genetics announced it is suspending its HIV drug development program and will focus instead on oncology drugs. The company says it is taking this step “for strategic, business reasons; and a reduction in workforce.”

Myriad had been developing a maturation inhibitor called bevirimat (MPC-4326, PA-457) since 2009, after purchasing the rights to the drug from Panacos Pharmaceuticals."

GOVERNOR RENDELL PLANS TO SLASH LIFE SAVING HIV SERVICES IN PA

2010-05-19T10:18:00.002-04:00

JOIN US IN PROTEST: WEDNESDAY, MAY 26 AT 12 NOON

Meet at the SW corner of Broad and Walnut Streets, outside the Bellevue Hotel (Rendell's local offices)

BACKGROUND:; $1.7 million of that is in Philadelphia alone. In the coming days, he will likely re-write the budget with EVEN MORE cuts

People with AIDS and their communities must REJECT this dangerous budget, which is balanced on the backs of poor people and people at greatest risk of HIV infection.

In addition to slashing the HIV prevention, Gov. Rendell's budget could:

. Cut funding for hospitals, education, essential social services

. Massive tax breaks to tobacco companies and big oil corporations

WHAT DO WE DO? We will be standing outside governor's Rendell's office to tell him he will make these cuts OVER OUR DEAD BODIES. Please join us at noon at the Bellvue to send him this message.

To endorse this action, if you have questions, or would like us to come speak about this to your group, please e-mail actupp@critpath.org or call Waheedah at (267) 231-2647.

Smallpox demise linked to spread of HIV infection

2010-05-17T21:25:00.001-04:00

BBC News - Smallpox demise linked to spread of HIV infection: "Experts say the vaccine used to wipe out smallpox offered some protection against the Aids virus and, now it is no longer used, HIV has flourished.
The US investigators said trials indicated the smallpox jab interferes with how well HIV multiplies.
But they say in the journal BMC Immunology it is too early to recommend smallpox vaccine for fighting HIV."

Photos from today's New York demo

2010-05-13T20:52:00.002-04:00

ACT UP Philly tells Obama: No More Lies! Keep your AIDS Promises!

2010-05-13T17:49:00.002-04:00

In the words of ACT UP member Cliff Williams, speaking in NYC today: "I am a member of Act up Philadelphia, PA. I am HIV+

In the spirit of empathy, I stand here before you, as an African (in descent)
American (by birth) a widower (as a husband) Who knows first hand about waiting list.

THEY ONLY LEAD TO DEATH!

I have empathy for a people, just like me, in mental, spirit of hope, wanting to live.

...

Empathy to the funders Empathy to the President I fear one day I'll plead Empathy for myself,because what happens globally will soon happen hear in America.

Africa we fight for you as if our lives depend on it because it does.

Act up Fight back, Fight Aids!"

Max's rebuttal to the Philly Weekly's "Devil's Advocacy"

2010-04-01T20:28:00.003-04:00

I'm writing my own opinions here. If other people in ACT UP have other opinions, please post them!

Way back at the beginning of the global financial crisis, Naomi Klein was on the Rachel Maddow show. At that point, she predicted that the insane, corrupt actions of U.S. and European bankers would become an excuse for the U.S. government to become even more pro-bank and pro-capital, at the expense, specifically, of poor people in Africa living with AIDS.

She was right. The United States has repeatedly used the global recession as an excuse to stop keeping their promises on global AIDS. The problem is, the recession was not just an unhappy accident. It was unfettered capitalism doing what it does best -- moving money around until it loses any meaning and just goes to making rich people richer, with no consequences to rich people when the house of cards comes crashing down.

Meanwhile, a slowed-down global economy makes it harder for people all around the world to get jobs, to afford food, to make money off of their own land, to buy medicine, to get to work and school safely, etc.

For some reason, even activists and progressive Americans seem to think that during a recession, we need to look inward and ignore the affects of our action on the rest of the world. That's wrong -- it's short-sighted and bad policy, not to mention morally bankrupt.

Here's why:

1) Fixing the problem of AIDS in Africa is an incredibly important thing to do for all of our political sakes. In Africa, AIDS is a flashpoint of the culture wars. In Uganda, President Museveni, famous for his anti-homosexuality bill, uses his AIDS work as a way to sugar-coat and promote a fundamentalist, homophobic, xenophobic agenda. He curries favor with Christians in the U.S. by pretending to fight AIDS (abstinence-based programs only of course) and then turns around and threatens his own HIV-positive citizens with death.
2) Fixing the problem of AIDS in Africa is an incredibly important thing to do for all of our health. Stopping the spread of diseases makes us all healthier. The fewer times AIDS is transmitted, the less likely it is to mutate and become resistant or more virulent or easier to spread.
3) The problem of AIDS in Africa is fixable. It takes money, which is readily available, even during the recession. The money to provide universal access to AIDS treatment could come from a) foreign governments with an obligation to stop screwing over African countries and start doing the right thing for once meeting the pledges they've already made.
b) a Currency Transaction Levy, which is a very small tax on every single currency trade (the kind of crazy speculative capitalism that screwed people with AIDS in Africa in the first place) which would raise billions and billions of dollars, even if the tax was so tiny that the big banks being assessed didn't even feel it.

The global recession is NOT a time to turn our backs on the people we have hurt the most, it's time to start holding the people who caused it accountable, and doing something to reverse the trend of the rich getting richer on the back of the poor and those infected with or affected by HIV and AIDS.

GLOBAL AIDS PROGRAMS WIN $9 BN PUBLISHER’S CLEARING HOUSE PRIZE

2010-04-01T08:36:00.001-04:00

Money will go to end AIDS drug waiting lists in Africa and expand access to prevention

EVENT DETAILS: PHILADELPHIA DEMOCRATIC COMMITTEE HQ, Walnut between Broad and 15th St, April 1st, 2010 at 1:30pm

PHILADELPHIA- Congressman Fattah and Senator Specter had an April Fool’s Joke played on them today. AIDS activists, dressed up as Publisher’s Clearing House officials, brought balloons, flowers and a giant check for $9 billion to their door, saying that it was the amount global AIDS programs were promised from Congress this year. Antonio Davis, one of the “Publisher’s Clearing House representatives,” chided Congress, saying “people with AIDS in developing countries aren’t going to get money to pay for life-saving medicine by hitting the jackpot. Doctors aren’t going to be able to buy the supplies they need to diagnose HIV by winning the lottery. And Congress isn’t going to come up with $9 billion by winning Publisher’s Clearing House. It’s up to Fattah and Specter, as members of the Appropriations Committees, to fight for $9 billion for global AIDS in 2011.”

According to the activists, Congress has not substantively increased funding for global AIDS in several years, and people who were promised life-saving AIDS treatment are being denied access as a result.

In 2008, Congress voted overwhelmingly to reauthorize the US Global AIDS Plan. They agreed that the programs should receive $48 billion through 2013, which amounts to more than three times the initial funding levels. Around the world, clinics receiving US government funding began to enroll more people in their programs, because they believed the US government would keep its promise to fund the programs.

“Talk about a cruel joke- Promising millions of people around the world access to HIV meds and other life-saving services and then taking it all back. That is exactly what has happened,” said Philadelphia GAWD (Global AIDS Watch Dogs) founder Yetta Smith. “Congress and the President have gone back on their word to fully fund programs that fight AIDS around the world. While 70% of people worldwide lack access to HIV treatment, banks are receiving billions of dollars in bailouts. This money could be going to save millions of lives.”

The activists presented the check to local Senator Specter and Representative Fattah because they sit on the Appropriations Committee and can make sure the funding goes to the designated programs – the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria. These two programs have received significant increased support from the US in the past, but because of the financial crisis, they have seen their budgets flat-line.

“PEPFAR and the Global Fund are doing important work to address the HIV epidemic in over 180 countries around the world, but their progress is hampered by broken promises. Specter and Fattah cannot sit idly by while millions die, and Congress does not increase funding,” Kaytee Riek, Director of Organizing for Health GAP, summed up.

A quick reflection on radical activism vs. "tea parties"

2010-03-26T14:56:00.003-04:00

I just heard that "A conservative blogger posted the home address of Congressman Tom Perriello, urging tea partiers to 'drop by.'" in an email from "Organizing for America." That tactic made me stop and reflect on tactics that ACT UP has used, such as showing up at Secretary of State Clinton's home to go caroling last Christmas. Here's what seems different to me.

First of all, the addresses of anyone who makes campaign contributions are public record, so no one involved in political action at anyone's home is doing any major snooping.

But... there's a big difference between:

Showing up at someone's house for a set time, to do a brief, planned, coordinated, non-permanently-vandalizing action vs. encouraging people to stop by a private residence whenever they feel like it to do whatever they feel like.

Showing up to engage in street theater (usually campy, like caroling, covering a home with a giant condom, or creating a temporary graveyard) vs. publishing Tom Periello's private residence in a context in which other community members have already engaged in permanent vandalism and called for burning him in effigy (a tactic historically connected to lynch mobs and other extra-judicial violence)

Holding a politician accountable for their actions and being clear on the policy changes we want to see, vs. holding a politician accountable for (exaggerated statements about) their beliefs and at times their very existence, it seems. For example, when ACT UP New York members put a condom on Jesse Helms' house, they were protesting his staunch refusal to allow people access to condoms to protect their health. They weren't calling him out for being Christian or exaggerating his position or suggesting that elected Christians have no business holding elected office. But tea-party bloggers seem to target people by saying, "they voted for health care reform, and therefore are socialists (or worse) and therefore should not serve in American politics." That's really different than holding a protest anywhere, the message of which is, "don't vote for healthcare reform because we think it's a bad idea."

"The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness" (new book)

2010-03-11T18:09:00.007-05:00

A new book by legal scholar and civil rights advocate Michelle Alexander argues that although Jim Crow laws have been eliminated, the racial caste system it set up was not eradicated. It’s simply been redesigned, and now racial control functions through the criminal justice system.

Gov. Forum Thursday 7pm, Arch St. Church

2010-02-15T23:12:00.002-05:00

Your Questions.
Their Answers.

Community Forum for the Next Governor

Thursday, February 18th
at 7pm
Arch St. United Methodist Church
55 North Broad Street
(at the corner of Broad and Arch Streets)

Come join ACT UP and many others to ask the PA Governor candidates about HIV, health care, and the issues that matter to us!!

With the Governor’s primary right around the corner, it is important for us to know where the candidates stand on the issues that matter most to us – education, housing, public benefits, job development, health care, prison reentry programs, and much more. Join a broad coalition of community-based organizations, unions and advocacy projects for this important educational forum where our social and economic needs set the agenda.

We ask the questions; the candidates tell us where they stand!

For more information, call (215) 568-4990.

If you can help volunteer at the forum please come at 6pm.

TERRIBLE NEWS: "Obama to propose spending freeze"

2010-01-25T23:11:00.003-05:00

In the State of the Union address, President Obama will apparently announce that he is freezing the federal budget, which means no increases in funding for anything except entitlements (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid), the military, homeland security, and some foreign aid.

For some programs, the budget won't even keep up with inflation, so it really means cuts to spending. According to the proposal, will last for three years.

For people with HIV/AIDS, that means cuts to already underfunded programs that provide medicine, doctor's visits, housing, and support. This means no money for clean needles to prevent the spread of HIV, no new prevention programs, no new research towards cures and vaccinations and microbicides...

This budget freeze affects all Americans and is the wrong way to confront a continuing economic crisis. In my opinion it's bad economics, bad politics, and ethically wrong.

But thinking about HIV/AIDS, it's important to remember that the disease is often its own economic crisis for each individual affected, one that was made worse by the big recession but which has sucked for a long time and will suck for a long time after the rest of the economy recovers, unless we spend the money needed to fix the problem.

Before the "housing crisis" 1 out of every 2 people with HIV faced homelessness at some point. It's probably worse now.
In Philadelphia alone, the AIDS housing waiting list is 2 years long, and Section 8 housing waiting list is so long it's closed for the foreseeable future. Again, that started before the housing crisis.
The recession has caused states to cut funding for AIDS treatment and care, leading to people dying on waiting lists for access to AIDS medicine.
Many, many states are cutting their AIDS budgets dramatically, closing doors of AIDS Service Organizations that provide outreach, care, treatment, prevention, housing, food, etc.

If we don't spend more money now on programs like the AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, Housing Opportunities for People With AIDS, and the Ryan White Care Act, issues of illness and homelessness that have only been getting worse will continue to spiral out of control. We can't sacrifice people's lives for the sake of a balanced budget. It's wrong.

It's also much more expensive in the long run: access to clean needles, medicine, and a home to live in cut rates of HIV transmission dramatically, better than any public service announcements or targeted prevention program. Letting people get sick, become more likely to spread HIV, more likely to end up in emergency rooms sick and dying, is expensive in the long run, short-sighted, and wrong.

For more coverage, politico.com was the first to leak the story.

If you agree that something must be done to stop this disaster of a budget, email actupphilly_at_gmail_dot_com to find out how you can take action. Stay tuned for updates and specific action alerts.

PS -- please forgive the ranting nature. It's late, I have a cold, and I'm very very angry.

ACT UP Lobbies Philadelphia's city council

2010-01-15T12:46:00.003-05:00

We kicked off the action phase of our housing campaign in November with a big, boisterous caroling and rally at City Hall (well-covered by media like the Philadelphia Weekly and Philadelphia Tribune. Then you called and emailed Mayor Nutter to remind him that you care about the AIDS housing crisis and that it's his job to solve it, as the mayor of one of the cities with the biggest housing crisis.

Yesterday morning, fierce ACT UP members Cliff, Henry, Leon, John, Samantha, and Jose delivered City Councilors data about the AIDS housing needs in their specific districts, and arranged to meet with them. Apparently, it was news to many staffers just how bad the AIDS housing crisis is here in Philadelphia.

ACT UP is starting to make City Hall solve this problem -- we know it's not the money that's the problem, it's the political will.

One way you can help is to join ACT UP, every Monday night at 6pm at St. Luke's church (on 13th just north of Pine St.). Another way is to email Michael Nutter and remind him that he must solve this problem! (If that link doesn't work, try pasting this one into your browser: http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5712/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1343).

ACT UP goes "caroling" at Sec. Clinton's house

2009-12-29T18:45:00.003-05:00

We Win! Funding for Syringe Exchange, and no dumb 1000 foot rule!

2009-12-23T13:17:00.003-05:00

In case you weren't sure that grassroots AIDS activism really worked, I can no promise you it does. This year, Congress lifted their ban on funding needle exchange programs. Here's how it went down, as far as I know:

1) Grassroots AIDS activists worked to get a President, Senators, and Representatives elected who would lift the ban.
2) They got into office and we immediately started writing, calling, protesting, opining in the media, and more, reminding them of their promises.
3) They balked.
4) We pressured. We talked to our Congresspeople, we wrote letters to the editor, we shined the media spotlight on those who were going back on their promises.
5) They balked some more.
6) We pressured some more. 26+ AIDS activists shut down the capitol building, getting arrested in the process. The media covered us.
7) Speaker Pelosi and Representative Obey had a little chat... the result: A House appropriations bill that lifted the ban on funding syringe exchange, sort of, but with a restriction that made it impossible to actually get funding.
8) We pressured some more. Phone calls, lobby visits, demonstrations, more letters to the editor... We made maps and calculated that syringe exchanges in Philly could only operate in the Schuylkill River, and in DC could only operate in Congress!
9) The Senate and the House missed their deadlines and needed to repackage their appropriations bill into one big bundle (the omnibus spending bill) and, knowing that they needed to lift the ban and do it right, managed to do it.

You can tell from the way they lifted the ban, by saying that exchanges could be located anywhere, but that public health and local law enforcements could ask them to relocate if needed, that they actually heard the voices of people who run needle exchanges and people who use them. We got those voices into their offices, in their faces, saying, "look, we know how this works and you better not mess it up." And we won. They listened. That's how activism and democracy are supposed to work.

ACT UP Op-ed follow-up to Sen. Specter's office

2009-12-23T13:09:00.002-05:00

The following letter was sent to Sen. Specter's office in follow-up to the op-ed published in the Philly Gay News.

ACT UP feels strongly that the public option is the most realistic and effective option to expand coverage. And while we realize that the Senate bill will pass this week without a public option or Medicare expansion, we also know the process is not over yet. We call for Sen. Specter and all our representatives to do everything in their ability to push for final conference legislation that looks more like the House bill. We realize that it is politically unlikely that a public option will make it out of conference, but now is the time for progressive politicians to stand up for what is needed: a public option and Medicare expansion.

While we acknowledge that the Senate bill does include important provisions to help expand coverage (around 30 million), we are very angry that there are not enough subsidies and cost containments in the Senate bill to make sure it is affordable. Again, we push for Sen. Specter to do all he can for cost supports to be adopted from the House bill to make sure people can afford it. The most politically unpopular thing, and jeopardizing in the upcoming primary, for Sen. Specter to do is to help pass legislation that pushes people to buy health insurance that they cannot afford.

We are also angry that the Senate bill has a quasi-mandate by penalizing people for not buying health insurance. This tactic is exactly what insurance companies want: no public option for competition, and forcing people to buy poor-quality private insurance plans. We are the only country in the world that has for-profit health insurance companies, and by the very definition they will continue to have a perverse profit incentive to exclude or minimize care to poor people and people who need it. We need a federal (not state-based) public option to keep insurance companies honest, and/or we need to forbid that companies make a profit on health insurance.

ACT UP is also angry that there are other concessions in the Senate bill to big industry and interests groups at the expense of consumers and people with HIV/AIDS. In particular, the Senate bill appeases to the wishes of Big PhRMA by ensuring that they will have a monopoly on biologics (or biotech) drugs and prevent cheaper generics from being produced. This a very big deal. Biologics are the cutting edge of new research and have some of the best prospects for innovative life-saving medications, and by excluding generics it will ensure that the lives of people with HIV/AIDS and others will be rationed for the sake of profit. The Senate bill also prohibits re-importation of cheaper drugs abroad, highlighting the hypocrisy that other governments have effective ways to negotiate for cheaper life-saving drugs while ours stands by and does nothing. ACT UP knows PhRMA's lies and greed quite well. PhRMA's argument for their record profits are that it is needed for R&D. This is a lie. Major pharmaceuticals spend more on advertising than R&D; much of the R&D and clinical trials are already done by the NIH, universities and other federal agencies; and pharmaceuticals mostly just produce second generation "copycat" medications to enforce new patent rights and delay generic competition.

This time around, there was a deliberate decision made by the administration to give PhRMA, AMA, hospitals, device manufacturers, etc. a free ride and include no pressure to reduce profits and costs imposed on consumers and taxpayers. This still needs to be done in future legislation, otherwise Medicare, and the country, will go broke. And the bigger issue is the need to change fundamental incentives in our health care system, that reward more procedures and treatments, rather than rewarding and prioritizing disease prevention and keeping people healthy. A practical example of this is requiring that routine HIV tests are covered under all public and private insurance plans, as early detection is key to early treatment and preventing further transmission. The Senate bill does not address this; the House bill, on the other hand, does and it also contains greater support for other prevention programs, including the creation of a prevention and wellness trust. No matter what happens, health care reform is far from over and there is still much to be done... but for now the House bill points to the better direction in the short and long-term.

As the op-ed said, though, there are also other areas that we are continuing to look for Sen. Specter to be a real leader on fighting for HIV/AIDS programs. We look for him to fight for more funding for HIV prevention programs, and particularly for dedicated funding for syringe exchange programs now that the ban has been lifted. Syringe exchange programs have been proven to be the cheapest and most effective way to reduce HIV and Hep C transmission. We, and others around the world, also desperately look for him to pressure President Obama to fulfill his promises and fully fund PEPFAR and the Global Fund.

Specter has an opportunity to further his legacy on fighting for people with HIV/AIDS, and we will continue to fight for him to do so.

Sincerely,
ACT UP

A very merry Christmas to you, Hillary Clinton!

2009-12-23T13:05:00.003-05:00

A van full of ACT UP members went caroling at Secretary Clinton's house in Chappaqua, NY last night singing,

You better watch out,
You better not cry,
You better fight AIDS,
I'm telling you why:
Activists are here at your house!

Ms. Clinton was apparently home last night and couldn't miss the 50+ activists who braved the cold and snow to demand that she keep her campaign promises to fully fund the fight against global AIDS.

As a candidate, Ms. Clinton, along with then-candidate Obama, pledged $50 billion to fight global AIDS by expanding treatment and prevention efforts through PEPFAR (the President's Emergency Fund for AIDS Relief) and meeting the US's commitment to the Global Fund for AIDS, TB, and Malaria). What happened instead is that President Obama and Secretary Clinton first budget cuts funding for Global AIDS over the next several years. Under their watch, clinics in Africa have stopped taking new patients, hospitals are facing stock outs (drugs aren't available because there's no money to buy them), and lines and waiting lists for treatment are growing for the first time since PEPFAR began (under the watch of President Bush).

Secretary Clinton has a chance to fully fund the fight against global AIDS, but she must stand up now and remind President Obama and the rest of his administration that we must meet our obligations, keep our promises, and end the pandemic.

ACT UP Op-ed in Philly Gay News

2009-12-23T13:04:00.003-05:00

Published in the Philly Gay News on Friday, Dec. 18

An open letter to Sen. Specter

Dear Sen. Arlen Specter:

In your long career in the Senate, ACT UP has brought you many gifts. Remember when we brought you a spine, asking you to stand up for people with HIV? We thought this open letter would be another nice way to remind you to keep standing up to improve healthcare, expand HIV prevention, fully fund global AIDS programs and say thanks for what you’ve done so far.

Right now, the Senate is considering healthcare reform, and you have come out in favor of a robust public option — a critical measure to address health inequalities and ensure that all people have access to health insurance and can afford basic care.

A public option is particularly meaningful for people living with HIV/AIDS. HIV is a disease that is driven by social and economic injustice and stigma. For people living with HIV/AIDS, Medicaid and Medicare are lifesaving programs that help ensure affordable access to care, but people must often wait until they’re too sick to access these programs. A public plan would mean everyone had access to HIV care and general healthcare before getting “sick enough.”

Additionally, given the discriminatory nature of private insurance companies, many people forego HIV testing in fear that they’ll be dropped from their private insurance plan. Congress must strike down all preexisting-conditions clauses in insurance plans, and they should mandate that all insurance programs cover routine testing for HIV. More than 20 percent of individuals in the U.S. infected with HIV are unaware of their infection; early diagnosis of HIV is critical to effective treatment and prevention.

As a moderate Democrat, we need you to do more than support the public option. Your colleagues, Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), are holding up lifesaving healthcare reform because of their opposition to the public option. We cannot afford, in money or health, to let for-profit insurance companies continue to run our healthcare.

In addition to your support of healthcare reform, on Sunday you joined with your colleagues to pass the 2010 Appropriations Bill. For the first time in a decade, this bill allowed federal funding of syringe exchange. Your support of this important HIV and hepatitis-C prevention intervention was critical to ending the federal ban and ensuring HIV infections decline. Thank you for your support.

Now that federal funding of syringe exchange is an option, we need your help again. You sit on the Appropriations Committee, which means you can help ensure HIV-prevention programs are fully funded.

You have been a key champion in the fight against global AIDS as well. You have fought for increased funding of global AIDS programs, especially those dedicated to the training and retention of health professionals in Africa. Unfortunately, global AIDS programs have not received sufficient increases in funding, and waiting lists for AIDS medications are growing in developing countries. The world finally was starting to make progress in fighting AIDS, and ACT UP is looking to you to continue your leadership in global AIDS and fight for $9.25 billion for global AIDS programs in 2011.

Sen. Specter, you’ve done well these past few years. But, as you head into an election year, we call on you to continue to show that you are truly committed to advancing the needs of people with HIV/AIDS in Pennsylvania, the United States and around the world.

— ACT UP Philadelphia

ACT UP Philadelphia is an activist organization led by and for people living with HIV/AIDS. The group meets every Monday at 6 p.m. at The Church of St. Luke and The Epiphany, 330 S. 13th St. Visit www.actupphilly.org for more information.

What are you doing for World AIDS Day?

2009-12-01T10:00:00.002-05:00

There are a lot of options. You could, for example, listen to Alicia Keyes' free YouTube concert. You could go to Starbucks and buy a Product(RED) gift card. You could volunteer with an AIDS Service Organization. You could get tested. You could talk to someone about AIDS.

All of which are fine things to do. But in my view they ignore the two fundamental causes of AIDS: the HIV virus, and injustice. The way AIDS works is that you get infected by the HIV virus, and it makes you sick. Getting infected can happen to anyone, but it happens disproportionately to people who are stigmatized, poor, and disenfranchised. The solutions to preventing AIDS are political solutions. Stopping politicians from keeping clean needles out of the hands of injection drug users. Stopping politicians from keeping condoms away from prisoners and young people. Stopping politicians from criminalizing and stigmatizing homosexuality. Forcing politicians to face and solve the problem of homelessness. Forcing politicians to put people's lives ahead of drug company profits. Forcing politicians to make sure everyone has access to affordable health care. Access to treatment, housing, health care, clean needles, condoms, justice, and enfranchisement are scientifically proven to fight transmission of the virus that causes AIDS. And politicians and corporations are the main things standing in our way. The spread of AIDS is not the fault of drug users, LGBTQ people, people who have sex, or mothers. The spread of AIDS is the fault of people unwilling to spend the money or political capital to solve the problem.

The other cause of AIDS is the HIV virus. Stopping viruses requires treatment and research. Which cost money. Which brings us back to the above point.

So this World AIDS Day, in addition to buying your Product (RED) coffee, listening to Alicia Keyes, or volunteering, take time to work for the political solution.

Contact Mayor Michael Nutter and tell him a 2-year AIDS housing waiting list is unacceptable: http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5712/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1343

Contact State AIDS Director Joseph Pease and let him know that returning or not applying for nearly $15 million dollars of state funding is unacceptable: http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5712/t/8185/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1255

Contact President Obama and let him know that earning a D+ on fighting AIDS is unacceptable, and that you expect him to achieve full marks next term (don't worry, he still can. He just needs your help to make this a hot political issue!) http://healthgap.org/press/wad09_report_card_pr.htm

ACT UP took action on AIDS housing yesterday. You can take action now.

2009-11-25T16:27:00.001-05:00

Dear Friend of ACT UP,

ACT UP and Proyecto Sol are outraged that 8,000 Philadelphians with HIV/AIDS don't have access to safe, affordable housing, and that Mayor Nutter's response is to spend NOTHING on AIDS housing. We know that housing saves lives, because for people with AIDS, being out on the streets or in a shelter is deadly.

We hope you saw this awesome video of our demonstration of our outrage, made by Philadelphia Weekly reporter Joel Mathis.

Now take a few seconds to tell Mayor Nutter how you feel about the fact that in order for a person who's HIV+ in Philadelphia to get a home, they first need to get sick with two opportunistic infections, and then spend two years in shelters or on the streets! Tell him that he can change this unacceptable situation by funding AIDS housing.

In the words of the 100 chanting, bell-ringing AIDS activists, "Mayor Nutter, we insist, end AIDS housing waiting lists!"

Sincerely,
ACT UP & Proyecto Sol
PS -- if the above links aren't working, click here http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5712/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1343 or paste the link into your browser.

AIDS housing waiting lists must go!

2009-11-20T09:24:00.006-05:00

PRESS ADVISORY 11/19/09

Press Contacts: Antonio Davis 215.715.8653, Max Ray 215.908.8939

**WORLD AIDS DAY-RELATED EVENTS**

AIDS ACTIVISTS DRESSED AS SALVATION ARMY BELL-RINGERS HAND OUT DOLLAR BILLS TO CALL FOR REAL CHANGE FOR HOMELESS PEOPLE WITH AIDS IN PHILADLEPHIA

Who- Members of ACT UP Philly, Proyecto SOL and housing activists dressed as Salvation Army bell ringers, complete with santa hats, bells and buckets

What- Will be rallying at LOVE Park and marching to City Hall. The marchers will be dressed as Salvation Army bell-ringers, complete with Santa hats, bells and buckets. But instead of asking for spare change, ACT UP will be giving out zero-dollar bills to let passersby know that Mayor Nutter can make real, life-saving change for homeless Philadelphians living with AIDS by ending the 165-person AIDS housing waiting list.

When/Where- One week before World AIDS Day - Tuesday November 24 @ 12 Noon beginning in LOVE Park and marching to City Hall

Background: People with AIDS need safe, affordable housing. Shelters and streets are deadly places for people with compromised immune systems. Research indicates that housing is as important as medication in positive health outcome for people AIDS, and that people with homes are less likely to transmit HIV. Currently, there are more than 8,000 people with AIDS in Philadelphia who do not have adequate housing. That is higher than anywhere else in the country, except for Puerto Rico. There are also over 160 people and families who have been waiting for more than two years to receive housing subsidies provided through the federal government. Unlike in other cities, the city of Philadelphia does not supplement federal AIDS housing funding with city dollars. ACT UP is demonstrating to demand that Mayor Nutter and the City of Philadelphia make housing for people with AIDS a budget priority, and find the funding to end the wait list. This demonstration will help kick off a wider campaign to win housing for all people with HIV and AIDS. World AIDS Day is December 1st each year and commemorates the lives of those who have passed away due to AIDS. This year, ACT UP Philly is getting ready to “mourn the dead and fight like hell for the living,” in the words of famous activist Mother Jones.

UPCOMING EVENT

December 1st - World AIDS Day (WAD) – Demonstration in Washington, DC

ACT UP Philly will also be participating in a World AIDS Day action in Washington DC, on Tuesday, December 1st. We will be taking a bus down to DC on Tuesday, leaving at 7:30am. Demonstrators will call for more AIDS housing funding (to help end the waiting list here in Philly and in other cities around the US), an end to the federal funding ban on syringe exchange, and increased global AIDS funding to meet global need and legislative requirement. Contact Kaytee Riek - 267.334.6984 or kaytee@healthgap.org.

###

Tell Pease to stop picking our pockets!

2009-11-04T10:37:00.005-05:00

Email State AIDS Director Joseph Pease

People living with HIV and AIDS in Pennsylvania have lost more that fifteen million dollars under State AIDS Director Joseph Pease's watch. Pease's office did not apply for a four million dollar National Minority AIDS Initiative grant (because they would have had to work over the weekend). His office also returned eleven million dollars of AIDS Drug Assistance Program funding to the federal government because they failed to spend the money. Returning federal money means that, for the next several years, our award will be eleven million dollars less than it should be, because the government thinks we don't need the money. So that's $15 million that people with HIV in Pennsylvania need and will never get back!

Check out our YouTube video of our trip to Harrisburg here:

Now, click here to email Joseph Pease and tell him that People with HIV in Pennsylvania deserve better!

Huge success of needle exchange in Australia -- govt. report

2009-10-21T18:39:00.002-04:00

"Distributing syringes to drug injectors had prevented at least 32,000 HIV infections and 100,000 hepatitis C infections across Australia in the past 10 years, new research has found.

"Harm reduction campaigner, Mr John Ryan, said the national Return on Investment 2 study showed that needle and syringe programs (NSP) had saved Australia $1.28 billion in health costs in the past decade years. ...

"'Only 0.1% of drug injectors are HIV positive, but 14% would be if there were not needle and syringe programs throughout thousands of places in Australia,' Mr Ryan said.

We've got the State AIDS Director on the run...

2009-10-15T11:21:00.002-04:00

...or does he just really need to get his teeth cleaned?

ACT UP went to Harrisburg to confront State AIDS Director Joseph Pease as he welcomed folks to a Ryan White funding conference. We were planning to call him out in front of his bosses and constituents for returning $11 million that was supposed to go to Pennsylvanians with HIV/AIDS, and failing to apply for an addition $4 million... because that would have required working on the weekend! Pathetic excuse...

So we show up, all business casual with fancy fliers and a speech prepared, and Mr. Joseph Pease is (once again?) AWOL -- citing a dentist appointment (Really? You schedule a dentist appointment the morning you're supposed to welcome your colleagues and federal grantmakers to a big conference?)

We think it's time for Joseph Pease to meet with those he's accountable to and answer to this:

Queer Health Is Political -- or, why attend the AIDS rally at the big gay march this weekend

2009-10-07T12:00:00.003-04:00

If you are going to be in DC for the Equality March this weekend (or even thinking about going), you should make it a point to go down to the ellipse Saturday evening for the AIDS rally and candle(glowstick)light vigil. Because:

1) While AIDS is not now and has never been "a gay disease" it does continue to affect gay men and transpeople disproportionately. Especially gay men and transpeople of color. And that's wrong and needs to be fought. It needs to be fought by fighting stigma and homophobia, by targeting homophobic doctors and insurers and lawmakers, changing hearts and minds and policies until everyone has access to the tools they need to stay healthy.

2) AIDS is not over. Thanks to AIDS activists, more people than ever have access to treatment that has turned an HIV diagnosis from a death sentence to a mostly manageable condition. But not everyone has access to the medicine they need, and HIV cases are rising among gay men, the only demographic in the country for which cases are rising.

3) AIDS activism is among the most effective, fun, smart, creative, and yes, sexy activism there is. Seriously. Kiss-ins, die-ins, big sexy rallies with sexy queers, glowsticks, music, poetry, and more. Groups like ACT UP have always known that the way to build a movement is to win stuff and have fun doing really serious, fierce, life-saving work. That being in-your-face about sex and drugs is the only way to lift stigma about sex and drugs and start the conversations that need to happen so we can stay safe and healthy.

So ACT UP is bringing the message that:

Press coverage of AIDS activist's funeral procession at the G20

2009-09-23T12:04:00.011-04:00

It looks like most of the local news and the Associated Press picked up the real story here: that unless rich G20 nations commit to the fight against global AIDS, provide universal access to treatment, and meet their obligations to the Global Fund millions will die of AIDS (a preventable, treatable disease!)

Click any photo below to see a larger version.

Here is some press coverage and some more photos and video:

WDUQ (NPR) - AIDS Group Marches On - http://wduqnews.blogspot.com/2009/09/aids-group-marches-on-g20.html
Philly Inquirer - G-20 Shows Off Reinvented City - http://www.philly.com/inquirer/world_us/20090923_G-20_shows_off_reinvented_city.html
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Demonstrations Begin in Earnest - http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09266/1000177-482.stm
Duquesne University Duke - AIDS Activists march in 'funeral procession' - http://media.www.theduquesneduke.com/media/storage/paper1278/news/2009/09/17/TheDukeAtG20/Aids-Activists.March.In.funeral.Procession-3779632.shtml
ABC Pittsburgh (WTAE) - G20 AIDS March winds through downtown - http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/g20/21058421/detail.html
ABC Pittsburgh (WTAE) Video - http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/video/21070225/index.html
NBC Pittsburgh (WPXI) - AIDS Activists hold 'funeral' protest downtown - http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/g20/21058421/detail.html
Fox 43 Harrisburg (AP) - AIDS protesters carry wreaths, march behind coffins to urge G-20 funding of global initiatives - http://www.fox43.com/news/sns-ap-pa--g20summit-aids,0,5369359.story
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Groups march downtown against AIDS, coal mining - http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09265/999896-100.stm
CBS Pittsburgh (KDKA) - Protesters demonstrate as G20 approaches - http://kdka.com/local/g20/Protestors.G20.summit.2.1201646.html
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review - Activists, police clash in court over feeding protest groups - http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_644536.html
Philadelphia (?) Examiner - G-20 Summit protesters stage funeral procession for those that will die of AIDS - http://www.examiner.com/x-23318-Pittsburgh-Photojournalist-Examiner~y2009m9d22-G20-Summit-protesters-stage-funeral-for-those-that-will-die-of-AIDS
RH Reality Check - G20 Coverage: Funeral Procession for HIV and AIDS funding - http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2009/09/22/funeral-procession-aids-funding-dont-let-it-happen-says-aids-activists
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Video - AIDS Activists Protest - http://www.post-gazette.com/multimedia/?videoid=102330&cmpid=mmpanel2
AP/Reuters Photos (first 12) - http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/slideshow/photo//090922/ids_photos_ts/r96641200.jpg/
Daily Motion (video) - G20 AIDS funeral march - http://openvideo.dailymotion.com/video/xakw3s_g20-aids-funeral-march_news
RH Reality Check - What was said at the G20 demo on HIV and AIDS funding - http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/node/11348
MSNBC - G20 AIDS March affects Bus Routes, Traffic Today - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32966700/ns/local_news-pittsburgh_pa/
U-Wire - AIDS Activists march in 'funeral procession', demand G20 leaders' attention - http://www.uwire.com/Article.aspx?id=4450568
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette G20 blog - Why I'm joining the funeral procession 9/22, 2pm, Grant and Liberty - http://www.pgpremium.com/g20/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=why-im-joining-the-funeral-procession-9-22-and-2pm-grant-and-liberty-downtown-.html&Itemid=59

AP Story also carried:
- R&D Mag - http://www.rdmag.com/News/FeedsAP/2009/09/life-sciences-aids-protesters-demand-g-20-fund-disease-treatment/
- Lehigh Valley Live - http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/base/national-63/12536491948060.xml&storylist=penn
- York Daily Record - http://ydr.inyork.com/ci_13394739
- WFMJ - http://www.wfmj.com/Global/story.asp?S=11177386
- CBS 3 Philadelphia - http://cbs3.com/wireapnewspa/AIDS.protesters.carry.2.1200621.html
- NE PA Times-Leader - http://www.timesleader.com/news/ap?articleID=2867332
- Taiwan News - http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1063919&lang=eng_news
- WYTV - http://www.wytv.com/content/news/pastate/story/AIDS-protesters-demand-G-20-fund-disease-treatment/4fwZx7wkBUyJWAMjX4ugnw.cspx

ACT UP's going to Pittsburgh to tell the G-20 to fight AIDS

2009-09-13T16:52:00.003-04:00

Tuesday, September 22nd. Rally at 2pm in Pittsburgh, free buses leave Philadelphia early in the morning!

To reserve your spot on the bus, email actupp@critpath.org or call 215-386-1981

PR: AIDS ACTIVISTS DEMAND A PUBLIC OPTION TO ADDRESS HEALTH CARE DISPARITIES, AND DISPUTE THE TACTICS OF 'TOWN HALL' DISRUPTORS

2009-08-27T20:05:00.003-04:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 27, 2009

AIDS ACTIVISTS DEMAND A PUBLIC OPTION TO ADDRESS HEALTH CARE DISPARITIES, AND DISPUTE THE TACTICS OF 'TOWN HALL' DISRUPTORS

ACT UP Philadelphia, the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power, calls on Senator Arlen Specter to ensure the passage of health care reform that includes a 'public option' with coverage for all Americans, including those living with HIV/AIDS and all those at risk of infection. ACT UP will be visiting Sen. Specter's Philadelphia office on Friday, August 28, and again the following week, to encourage him to defend the most vulnerable members of our society. "Health care reform is a chance to end all racial, economic, gender, and sexual-orientation-based disparities in accessing medical care" said Erica Goldberg, ACT UP member. "Without a 'public option', I fear that reform will exclude people living with HIV/AIDS.”

Health disparities, or lack of access to health resources based on race, economic status, gender, and sexual orientation, are astonishingly common. One recent report by the Black AIDS Institute concluded: "HIV-related health disparities between whites and Blacks have actually widened as medical advances have made HIV treatable...Meanwhile, Blacks are eight times more likely than whites to become newly infected with HIV" (Left Behind. Black America: A Neglected Priority in the Global AIDS Epidemic).

Philadelphia, in particular, suffers from one of the highest rates of new HIV infections in the country. HIV disproportionately impacts Black, Latino, low-income, MSM (men who have sex with men), transgender, and injecting drug user populations. These populations face discrimination, stigma, and lack of access to adequate health care, especially preventative and primary care services. ACT UP demands health care reform that addresses these disparities. ACT UP also sees an opportunity to address HIV prevention in a more systemic way. "Regular, reliable health care will give more people access to lifesaving health information. A lot of people get HIV because they don't know how to prevent it. Seeing a doctor regularly will allow people to get educated about the risks they face" said Paul Yabor, ACT UP member.

"Senator Specter has proven himself to be an ally in the past. He has worked to decrease costs of HIV drugs, fund Global AIDS programs, and support lifting the federal ban for syringe exchange programs. We know he will step up to the plate and prove himself here as well," said Antonio Davis, ACT UP member. Specter is a key vote to passing health care reform with the public option; we want to support him in doing what is most needed for his constituents and for the country.

ACT UP has a history of performing civil disobedience for health care access. We rely on factual public debate that does not suppress other people's voices, and that allows for the democratic input of all affected citizens. We resoundingly denounce the town-hall disruptors, especially those who have gone after Senator Specter in the past weeks. The anti-democratic nature of their disruptions is clear. Their actions are designed to intimidate, not create, discussion; their "movement" is underwritten or endorsed by corporate interests; and their disruptions are based on misperceptions and distortions of the truth. They have proven that they do not want a debate: they want to kill the debate, and thus kill health care reform, rather than address our national need to increase coverage, access and quality, and reduce costs. Our stance is clear: either our country takes measures to end health disparities and exorbitant costs, or we give in to a for-profit health care model in which only those who can afford it get adequate care.

ACT UP Philadelphia is an activist organization led by and for people living with HIV/AIDS. Since 1988, ACT UP has been a preeminent grassroots activist group calling for funding for effective prevention, treatment and care services for people living with and at risk for HIV.

###

PR: Forward Progress in PA for Syringe Exchange, New Road Blocks at Federal Level

2009-08-27T19:52:00.003-04:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 20, 2009

Forward Progress in PA for Syringe Exchange, New Road Blocks at Federal Level

In Pennsylvania, slow but steady progress has been made to eliminate the requirement for a prescription to purchase syringes. Right now, Pennsylvania is one of only a handful of states in the US that requires a prescription to buy syringes in stores. Health advocates have been working hard to allow anyone access to new syringes; these changes have been making their way through the state regulatory bodies. This is especially important for the 65 counties in PA that do not have syringe exchange programs and whose residents therefore do not have access to new, clean syringes.

In the words of the HIV Policy Collaborative, "This change will bring Pennsylvania more into line with the national trend in making sterile needles and syringes available as a means of reducing transmission of Hepatitis C and HIV, through the elimination or reduction of syringe sharing by injection drug users." At a recent meeting in Harrisburg, activists from Prevention Point Philadelphia, Prevention Point Pittsburgh, and the AIDS Law Project provided testimonies on the necessity for providing people with easy access to clean syringes. It is anticipated that within the next few weeks this change will be official.

On the federal level, debate around changing syringe exchange regulations is also happening. Currently, the federal budget bans the funding of syringe exchange programs, which means that local syringe exchanges, like Prevention Point Philadelphia, must find alternative means to fund their programs, leaving them with limited sources and funds. This year the House of Representatives removed the ban from their version of the Appropriations Bill, while the Senate kept the ban language in their version. Congressional leaders will have to resolve this difference in conference when they decide on the final, compromise version of the bill. After the House lifted the ban, Speaker Nancy Pelosi rightly responded by saying that the "…scientific support for needle exchange could not be more clear. These initiatives are an effective public health intervention that reduces the number of new HIV infections without increasing the use of illegal drugs."

While the removal of the ban is seen as a victory by local activists and service providers, they are disappointed that the House of Representatives included an amendment which stipulates that federally-funded syringe exchanges cannot operate within 1,000 feet of schools, daycares, parks, playgrounds, video arcades, pools, and youth centers. The restrictions would severely limit the locations where syringe exchange programs could operate if they receive the much-needed federal funding.

In Philadelphia, needle exchange has been a proven strategy to dramatically reduce the spread of HIV and Hepatitis C among injecting drug users. According to the City Dept. of Health, HIV rates among injecting drug users reduced from 48% in the mid 1990’s to 22% in 2006. In Philadelphia, there are no locations where syringe exchange programs could operate within the new federal restrictions.

Jose de Marco, member of ACT UP Philadelphia and director of Proyecto Sol, says "After twenty years of fighting to stop HIV infections from the lack of access to clean syringes, this is a backhanded slap to add restrictions that will stop proven and effective HIV prevention."

ACT UP Philadelphia is an activist organization led by and for people living with HIV/AIDS. Since 1988, ACT UP has been a preeminent grassroots activist group calling for funding for effective prevention, treatment and care services for people living with and at risk for HIV.

###

siloma fund raiser

2009-08-20T14:52:00.003-04:00

i'm callin on all blogs and comment on this...we are havin a yard/bake sale....In Clark Park so we are askin any and everybody if u have some thing n ur house that is just sittin or u are just sick of lookin at it can u donate it to the cause.... all items are welcome,and all items that are donanted will help get people rides and others to get down to pittsburgh for the g20......if u have any thing to donate u can send email to
phillyg20@gmail.com...

THANKS SILOMA AND OTHERS

joe pease

2009-08-16T16:46:00.003-04:00

i was thinking to have a pool party in front of his office where ever that may be some ppl bring the bbq grill,food,waters,kids pool, swimgin trunks,water shoes,beach balls,and thing that has to do with and adult party setting and just have a good old fashion throw down

My take on health care town hall disruptions

2009-08-16T15:15:00.006-04:00

There have been some posts and alerts about attending health care town hall meetings on the blog lately, and I thought I'd post a few thoughts about what I think health care reform should include, and also what the difference is between ACT UP, who are some of the original activists who did direct action around health care, and the current right-wing direct action.

Things health care reform should include (borrowed heavily from our allies in the Prevention Justice Network http://www.preventionjustice.org/blog/untangling-health-care-reform-time-action):

Create a strong public insurance option.

Include the Early Treatment for HIV Act (ETHA), giving states the option to make Medicaid available to people living with HIV instead of being ineligible until an AIDS diagnosis as currently required.

Track and end health disparities, including health disparities for LGBTQ people (for whom health data is not collected and analyzed, so that we don't know and can't address it if there are worse health outcomes for LGBTQ people).

Expand Medicaid to all low-income adults, in particular childless adults who account for a large number of uninsured people living with HIV.

Increase eligibility for individuals with incomes up to 200% of the federal poverty level, or change how the federal poverty level is calculated.

And as for the people who are disrupting town hall meetings... AIDS activists have disrupted stuff before, and have bussed in disruptors, but there are some pretty glaring differences between grassroots AIDS activism and what we're seeing at these town hall meetings.

Town hall disruptors	AIDS Activists
Disruptions are designed to intimidate and silence fellow citizens participating in the democratic process.	Disruptions target meetings that aren't transparent or democratic, and bring those traditionally denied access to power to the table.
Direct action is underwritten by un-democratic interests (lobbyists and big business) and that fact is hidden or lied about.	Activists don't accept funding from the government or pharmaceutical companies and other businesses that profit off of the outcomes of action, and we say who we are and what we're about.
Pre-action teach ins deliberately distort facts and inspire fear and anger (which has led to violent and out of control behavior).	Pre-action teach-ins focus on facts and don't deliberately anger and provoke participants. Activists are encouraged to stay on message, and protest marshalls make sure all participants and bystanders stay safe and calm.

Health Care: Congressman Sestak speaks today (Wednesday) 6:30-7:30 in Center City; right-wing disruption likely

2009-08-11T20:50:00.015-04:00

See New York Times, Tuesday, The Roots of Rage at a Town Hall Meeting, about Senator Specter's meeting at Lebanon, PA, around 35 miles from Harrisburg. The right buses the same people from meeting to meeting.

Info on Sestak meeting Wednesday, 6:30, 315 S. Broad St., Philadelphia (click to enlarge):

Health Care Reform Actions in PA this Week!

2009-08-11T12:52:00.002-04:00

Please see this link from Health Care for America Now PA for information on important events this week in Philly and around the state for health care reform: http://blog.hcanpa.org/?p=166. The time is now for health care reform, lets make sure we get it right and that the right-wing doesn't mess it up!!

ACT UP Philly blogger does guest column for Housing Works Update

2009-07-31T09:45:00.002-04:00

All the articles in this episode of the update are great! Check them out at http://www.housingworks.org/news-press/category/aids-issues-update/

Mine is the 4th one, Guest Column: House Appropriations Bills Prove AIDS Activism Works.

PA Statewide Conference Call on HIV/AIDS Ryan White (Part B) $ that was returned!

2009-07-27T16:19:00.003-04:00

Statewide Conference Call on HIV/AIDS

Aug 4th @ 2pm, 218 339 4300, secret code: 787353#

We need to come together as a state to make sure that the needs of all people living with HIV/AIDS are being met. A first step is to hold the State Office of HIV accountable for not using money they were already awarded and for not applying for additional money.

The state returned over $11 million in Ryan White funds to the federal government that can not be used again in a future year. This is especially concerning because of the proposed severe social services cuts to the State budget. We gave back money that was already given to us in the face of a statewide budget crisis! This is ADAP money, which could have been used in innovative ways to assist with copays, deductibles and premiums. This is in addition to the Minority AIDS Initiative money that was not applied for and cannot be applied for again until the end of the full three year cycle of the grant.

Please join us to discuss this issue and raise other state issues. If you are unable to be on the conference call, please emailpastatewidehivlist@gmail.com with your contact information to receive notes and be included in future activities.

Good News / Bad News from the House of Representatives

2009-07-25T22:46:00.008-04:00

Good news first:

The House of Representatives finally lifted the ban on federal funding for syringe exchange programs! They passed an appropriations bill without that nasty little sentence...

It was a close vote, too, 218 to 211 so thanks and congratulations to everyone who worked on this, whether it was emailing or calling their Representative, writing a letter to the editor, sitting down for a meeting with a Representative's office, attending a demonstration, or even getting arrested in the US Capitol Building. It's been 20 years of hard work, but it paid off...

Now the bad news:

The House of Representatives included language restricting where needle exchanges can occur. Specifically, they can't be within 1000 feet of any school, daycare, playground, park, pool, video arcade, or youth center.

Practically this means there is literally nowhere they can operate in most urban neighborhoods. Want proof? Check out these maps...

Philadelphia:

Zoomed in on one of the neighborhoods where you might have thought you could squeeze something in -- note how even more schools show up and you realize nope, it's really impossible:

Just in case you thought it was Philly-specific, here's South East Washington DC:

And in case you're thinking this will only be a problem on the East Coast, here's downtown Des Moines, IA:

All of these maps were created by using Google Earth to locate all of the schools, daycares, playgrounds, parks, pools, video arcades, and youth centers within a town, and then using Geometer's Sketchpad to draw 1000-foot radius circles around each location. If you know of an easier way to do this, please comment!

Also, feel free to use these maps, but please give credit to ACT UP Philly and this blog. http://actupphilly.blogspot.com

Finally, if you'd like me to make a map of your city or town, please leave a comment.

2 bits of good news!

2009-07-19T15:51:00.003-04:00

Friday was a good day for AIDS activists and people with HIV in the US. The House Appropriations Committee passed an appropriations bill that, for the first time in 11 years, did NOT ban funding on syringe exchange. In addition, they also passed an appropriations bill that increased funding for Housing Opportunities for People With AIDS (HOPWA) programs to $350 million, $40 million more than last year.

This is exciting news, but the process isn't over yet.

One bad amendment was accepted on syringe exchange, which mandates that federally funded syringe exchanges cannot operate within 1,000 feet of a school, park, public pool, arcade, or several other types of places--which would make syringe exchange in urban areas nearly impossible. Another amendment was considered to fully reinstated the ban. This failed, 33 to 24. Thank goodness!

We can expect more of the same, or even worse, this week when the full House votes on the appropriations bill. We will need to defeat those amendments and make sure the ban on funding of syringe exchange stays out of the appropriations bill.

So what happens now? After the House considers the appropriations bill, the Senate will need to pass their version. We will work to ensure the Senate version removes the ban on funding syringe exchange, with *no restrictions*, and increases funding for AIDS housing programs.

Anyone who doubts the power of grassroots action and protest to make change, take note - last week, 26 people were arrested in the Capitol Rotunda calling for an end to the federal ban on funding of syringe exchange, and increased funding for AIDS housing and global AIDS programs. And guess what? We're well on our way to win all three!

Police arrest 26 AIDS activists at Capitol protest

2009-07-11T23:50:00.003-04:00

"A group of AIDS activists was arrested Thursday for unlawfully demonstrating in the Capitol rotunda, a Capitol Police spokeswoman said. ...

"The activists carried signs in support of funding for needle exchange, HIV/AIDS housing and programs aimed at fighting AIDS. They chanted, 'Fight global AIDS now,' and, 'Clean needles save lives.' They marched in a circle before lying down on the floor. ...

"The activists were part of a coalition of five AIDS groups from Washington, Philadelphia and New York. They included ACT UP Philadelphia, DC Fights Back, Health GAP, New York City AIDS Network and Housing Works."

Read more in Associated Press, July 10, 2009.

Note:

See photos at http://www.sound-the-alarm.org/photos2.html

Full press coverage at http://www.sound-the-alarm.org/documents/July9thpress.pdf (15MB download).

Obama's FY 2010 Housing Budget Proposal Breakdown

2009-07-11T23:17:00.001-04:00

Available online here: http://www.endhomelessness.org/content/general/detail/2312

Pennsylvania Returns Tens of Millions of Dollars for AIDS Care During State Financial Crisis

2009-06-19T12:14:00.005-04:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 18, 2009

Pennsylvania Returns Tens of Millions of Dollars for AIDS Care During State Financial Crisis

Pennsylvania will be returning over $11 million for AIDS care to the federal government. Pennsylvania was allocated this money through Ryan White Care Act money, the major federal fund for HIV/AIDS treatment. According to ACT UP member Max October, "The state turned down free money. Pennsylvanians lost the money this year, and we are unable to get that $11 million dollars in any future year. This is unacceptable. "

This underspending comes at a time when:

§ The Pennsylvania Senate has proposed a 25% cut to HIV funding.

§ Infection rates are rising in almost every demographic.

§ Local municipalities across the state are facing budget crises, including a major budget crisis in Philadelphia.

In many regions of Pennsylvania, there are no dedicated AIDS Service Organizations. AIDS services are coordinated by general nonprofits and local public healthdepartments. Patients have to travel sometimes hundreds of miles to access primary care physicians with the specialized knowledge required to treat HIV and accompanying Opportunistic Infections. There is significant need statewide for more physicians, social workers, and public health workers with HIV/AIDS-specific training and expertise. According to an AIDS social worker, "This money could have been used in creative ways to help with people living with HIV/AIDS with medication and medical coverage-related costs. It's absurd that Pennsylvania would return money that we need so badly to support people living with HIV/AIDS in rural areas."

A consistent pattern is emerging: the state's Division of HIV/AIDS is not aggressively seeking out funding sources, nor connecting funding sources with the demonstrated needs of vulnerable Pennsylvanians.

Call for Apology and Accountability of Director Joseph Pease

There is clear need across Pennsylvania for AIDS services, testing, and prevention. In addition, there is need to utilize funding in creative ways to improve infrastructure and access to care and medications for people outside major metropolitan areas.

Despite the clear need, the Director of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Bureau of Communicable Diseases Division of HIV/AIDS, Joseph Pease, has failed to follow through. His office has not released an epidemiological study since 2004. He failed to spend tens of millions of dollars already given to the state for HIV/AIDS services. His office failed to apply for a 3-year National Minority AIDS Initiative (NMAI) grant, resulting in another significant loss of up to $12 million over the next three years.

For these reason, ACT UP Philadelphia is calling for public apology and accountability from Director Pease. Pease must account for why no epidemiological study has been done since 2004, why his office failed to apply for the NMAI grant, and how his office let tens of millions of dollars slip through the cracks. He must apologize publicly for his actions, and develop a plan to aggressively seek out and use funding to meet the needs of Pennsylvanians living with HIV/AIDS.

YIKES! Big cuts on the table in the Pennsylvania Budget

2009-06-07T17:57:00.003-04:00

Things have been really busy at ACT UP these days... it's budget season, not to mention we're gearing up for a big housing campaign.

Some quick updates: we're collecting and crunching the numbers on hundreds of housing surveys we've collected, we've been meeting with AIDS and housing activists in Philadelphia and thinking about needs and strategies, and we've been doing tremendous research (some documented on this blog) about how housing is funded and who makes housing decisions in Philadelphia.

Not to mention we've been strategizing about how to respond to the cuts and flat-funding of AIDS treatment and prevention services that are on the table in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Federal Budgets.

Here's the update on the state budget. While most money spent on HIV/AIDS in Pennsylvania is federal, the state has two budget items related to AIDS. The first is for AIDS medicine, which, thank goodness, is not being cut (it's being maintained at previous years' levels).

The second is money that is, according to the state, used to fund "a coordinated strategy to prevent and change high-risk behaviors and provide resources and direction for sustaining preventive behavior and avoiding infection with HIV....The program includes on-site training, both print and electronic public information services, community intervention projects for at-risk populations and the provision of care, case management and supportive services for persons infected and affected by HIV/AIDS. Confidential and anonymous HIV testing and partner notification services are also provided at over 500 sites statewide."

Governor Rendell and the House of Representatives proposed maintaining current funding levels at 10 million dollars, as they have been in the last couple of years. Of course, we'd like to see increases in the funding, to combat rising infection rates and unmet needs. But it gets worse... the Senate is proposing CUTTING THIS FUND BY 25%.

That would mean drastic cuts or even closure of agencies providing prevention and support services like HIV testing, counseling, and personal care.

Fortunately, it's not too late to prevent these cuts -- the House of Representatives and Senate will get together to hammer out the differences in their proposed budgets, and the Governor then has to approve the joint proposal.

You can help them make the right decision by contacting your State Representatives and Senators, and Governor Rendell, and asking them to reject the cuts proposed by the Senate.

You can find their contact information at http://www.legis.state.pa.us/.

Protest/Press Conference on Philly's Budget Tomorrow

2009-05-20T17:14:00.002-04:00

Join the Coalition For Essential Services on Thursday at 9:30 AM at a press conference to protest passage of next year's city budget, outside City Council chambers, Room 400, City Hall, and at 10 AM in Room 400, City Hall.

ACT-UP is particularly concerned about changes to health care and housing: the proposed fees for the formerly free city health centers and the proposed cut to the Housing Trust Fund.

More Budget Fun...

2009-05-17T19:23:00.004-04:00

I spent the afternoon trying to gather information about where the money that supports Philadelphians Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) comes from.

For my messy first draft of an organizational/funding chart, check out these two links:
Housing Money and Authority in Philadelphia: http://tinyurl.com/philly-housing-map
Office of Housing and Community Development Funding and Programs in Philadelphia: http://tinyurl.com/ohcd-map

I also spent some quality time with federal, state, and local budgets. Here's what I've figured out:

1) Good(ish) news on the local level: if Mayor Nutter gets what he wants from the state (permission to raise the sales tax and put off paying into the pension fund) he will probably be able to maintain current levels of shelter beds and other housing programs. http://voteforhomes.org/media-mayors-announcement-and-budget-address

2) Bad news on the local level: the Mayor's budget includes fees for accessing the formerly free city health clinics. All the available research tells us this means fewer people will use the clinics, and emergency room visits will go up while public health goes down. Guess who pays for the much more expensive emergency room visits (hint: it's not the city!)http://www.philly.com/inquirer/home_top_stories/20090306_New_fees_likely_at_Phila__health_centers.html

3) Bad news on the state level: The recession has hit the state hard. While they're going to maintain a lot of important health and human services funding, HIV/AIDS programs are being flatlined (no increase) or even cut. The only exceptions are a $12,000 increase for the state's contribution to HOPWA (Housing Opportunities for People With AIDS) and a possible increase for the state's contribution to Ryan White funds (it's hard to tell, because it looks like one program has been split into two). Source: http://tinyurl.com/pa-budget

4) Bad news on the federal level: President Obama has flatlined HOPWA. I think that the program will have to make cuts, because I think their obligations (stuff they have to pay for) is going to go up, and they aren't getting the funding to cover it. This is really bad news for AIDS housing, and coming at a time when there's all this exciting evidence showing that housing is as important as medicine for AIDS treatment, and really important to prevention, too. Of course, grassroots AIDS activists have known this since the beginning of the crisis...

5) OK news on the federal level: Ryan White funds (which, as far as I can tell, is where most of the non-housing money for PLWHA comes from) have gotten a small increase, though it's definitely not what we asked for...

6) Good news on the federal level (finally!): HUD (Housing and Urban Development) got 4 billion dollars ($4,000,000,000) to build new housing through the stimulus. Some of that money is specifically for people with disabilities, which includes people with HIV/AIDS. So our state and local governments can use the money to build more AIDS housing.

And finally, a question: does Philadelphia use Pennsylvania's Homelessness Assistance Program money. If so, what city department uses it, and how?