National
AIDS 2012: Sebelius unveils public-private collaborations to fight disease
HHS to work with MAC AIDS Fund, Walgreens, others
Secretary of Health & Human Services Kathleen Sebelius announced four HIV/AIDS private-public initiatives Sunday. (Blade photo by Michael Key)
Health & Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced four new public-private initiatives on Sunday night aimed at removing barriers that cause some living with HIV/AIDS within the United States to fall out of care.
Sebelius announced the projects — including a new $4.5 million multi-year project with the MAC AIDS Fund called the Care for Life Initiative — during remarks she delivered as the final speaker on the opening night of the 19th International AIDS Conference, which is being held in the United States for the first time since 1990. An estimated 25,000 are in attendance for the week-long conference in D.C.
“Perhaps the most important principle in our national strategy is one we’ve been reminded of over and over again in our response to HIV/AIDS: none of us can do this alone,” Sebelius said. “That’s why we’re making a new effort to reach to community-based organizations, businesses, foundations, NGOs, faith organizations and more.”
The Care for Life Initiative is a collaboration of the MAC AIDS fund, which was established in 1994 to support people who are living with HIV/AIDS across the world, and has three arms that aim to keep people with HIV/AIDS within care, according to a statement from the organization:
- A $4 million partnership with AIDS United over the next three years to create an innovation fund on the both the national and regional levels to improve retention in care and treatment adherence. Geographic focuses will be determined based on need and capacity of the local providers to address that need. It will also involve an open call for proposals.
- Working with the Health Resources and Services Administration, or HRSA, for a pilot launch of UCARE4LIFE, an evidence-based program that will employ mobile texting to improve care retention and medication adherence. With a focus on Southern states, the two-year project consists of developing a message library for delivering phone text notifications to HIV-positive individuals — in English and Spanish — regarding medical appointment reminders and taking medications.
- MAC AIDS Fund will work with HHS and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief to convene a meeting of international leaders in fall 2012 on leveraging global lessons on HIV care. This forum is expected to explore lessons from PEPFAR that can be applied to the United States for best practices on treatment and retention.
According to the MAC AIDS Fund, under the current system, one in two people living with HIV/AIDS in the United States falls out of care.
Nancy Mahon, global executive director of the MAC AIDS Funds, said the Care for Life Initiative is important because it uses new technologies and ideas in its outreach to people with HIV/AIDS.
“We cannot end the epidemic without breakthrough approaches that support and empower those living with HIV/AIDS to stay connected to the care and life-saving treatment they deserve,” Mahon said.
Besides the Care for Life Initiative, Sebelius also hit on the other three initiatives during her remarks. With the pharmaceutical retailer Walgreens, she announced a three-year partnership with the Centers for Disease Control to explore ways in which pharmacies can help patients stay on their medications. According to a news statement, Walgreens is supplying nearly $1 million in in-kind services for this initiative.
With Medscape, a leading provider of online continuing education for U.S. clinicians, Sebelius unveiled partnership training programs with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid to help clinicians better understand and address HIV patients’ needs. According to a news statement, three new training modules have already been created for physicians, nurses and other medical professionals.
Finally, Sebelius announced that HHS is partnering with the eight largest AIDS drug companies — Abbot Laboratories, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol Myers Squibb, Gilead, Genentech, Johnson & Johnson, Merck and ViiV — to create a single application form for AIDS medications offered through their patient assistance programs.
“I want to thank all of these partners for stepping up,” Sebelius said. “And we will continue to seek out new public-private collaborations that will help us beat this disease.”
In addition to announcing the new public-private partnerships, Sebelius also revealed that the Food & Drug Administration would announce this week that more than 150 antiretroviral drugs are now available through PEPFAR.
The secretary also enumerated earlier initiatives of the Obama administration, including last week’s decision to distribute nearly $80 million to the states “to allow them to fully clear” wait lists for AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, which provide HIV/AIDS drugs to low-income people. An estimated 2,000 people nationwide had been awaiting drugs through programs.
According to a statement from HHS, around $69 million will be sent to 25 states and territories and, based on estimates provided by the states, will eliminate any waiting lists. The remaining $10 million — a portion of which was allocated by the Affordable Care Act — will be distributed to community-based health clinics nationwide to expand access for 14,000 new HIV/AIDS patients for medical and support services.
Other initiatives against HIV/AIDS under the Obama administration that Sebelius touted were recent FDA approval of an at-home HIV test and using Truvada to prevent HIV infection. Sebelius also credited the Bush administration, calling PEPFAR, which was established under the previous administration, one of “the great health success stories of the 21st century.”
“Our task now is to make it even stronger,” Sebelius said.
“Under President Obama, we’re on pace to achieve an ambitious goal of reaching an additional two million people around the world with life-saving treatment by the end of 2013. At the same time, we’re putting a renewed focus on the key ‘combination prevention’ interventions that have proven most effective in combating HIV.”
The secretary’s mention of PEPFAR received among the most applause of anything discussed that evening before an audience that included many HIV/AIDS advocates from overseas. Obama’s fiscal year 2013 budget request cuts the program by half a billion dollars, but the White House has said PEPFAR is an example of a program that is doing more with less because of the reduced cost of drugs.
Sebelius wasn’t the only public official representing the United States on the stage during the opening night of the conference. Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), a renowned LGBT and HIV/AIDS advocate, also spoke on stage to call for an end to the epidemic, observing it has had a particularly devastating impact on black Americans.
“Although AIDS has made the transition from a death sentence to a chronic disease, new infections unfortunately continue at alarming rates,” Lee said. “HIV/AIDS disproportionately affects no group of people in our country more than African Americans. Of the 1.4 million people in the United States living with HIV, nearly half are black men and women, even though blacks make up 14 percent of the population.”
Last week, Lee announced that had introduced into the U.S. House legislation called the “Ending the HIV/AIDS Epidemic Act.” The bill has 26 co-sponsors who are all Democrats and aims to establish a policy and financing framework to eliminate AIDS domestically and abroad.
The bill aims to fight HIV/AIDS by providing additional funds for programs such as the AIDS Drug Assistance Programs; addressing policy barriers to accessing prevention and care, such as encouraging condom use in prisons; and calling for a more advanced strategy overseas to end the global AIDS epidemic.
D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray also took to the stage to welcome international attendees to D.C. and talk about how HIV/AIDS has impacted the city.
“HIV/AIDS has crossed all racial, ethnic, religious and socio-economic borders,” Gray said. “It is a disease that knows no boundaries.”
According to Gray, an estimated 20,000 people in D.C. have been infected with HIV/AIDS, and 10,000 residents have died as a result of the disease.
Other speakers on Sunday were Annah Sango, a Zimbabwe advocate living with HIV who seeks visibility for female patients, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, who said he was the first World Bank president to the address the international conference, UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé, South African Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe and Mark Dybul, global AIDS coordinator for President George W. Bush who touted that administration’s achievements in the global AIDS fight.
The co-chairs of the conference, Elly Katabira, a Ugandan activist and president of the International AIDS Society, and Diane Havlir, chief of HIV/AIDS Division at the University of California, San Francisco, welcomed attendees to the conference. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon prepared a video message for attendees.
Also on Sunday, the White House unveiled a video message from Obama welcoming the international attendees to the conference. The video message was prepared in lieu of a live appearance by Obama at the conference.
In the video, Obama talks about HIV/AIDS advocates’ commitment to fighting the disease and a voice-over talks about discovery of the disease in the 1980s as well as activism and scientific advances to thwart it.
Watch the video below:
New York
Men convicted of murdering two men in NYC gay bar drugging scheme sentenced
One of the victims, John Umberger, was D.C. political consultant
A New York judge on Wednesday sentenced three men convicted of killing a D.C. political consultant and another man who they targeted at gay bars in Manhattan.
NBC New York notes a jury in February convicted Jayqwan Hamilton, Jacob Barroso, and Robert DeMaio of murder, robbery, and conspiracy in relation to druggings and robberies that targeted gay bars in Manhattan from March 2021 to June 2022.
John Umberger, a 33-year-old political consultant from D.C., and Julio Ramirez, a 25-year-old social worker, died. Prosecutors said Hamilton, Barroso, and DeMaio targeted three other men at gay bars.
The jury convicted Hamilton and DeMaio of murdering Umberger. State Supreme Court Judge Felicia Mennin sentenced Hamilton and DeMaio to 40 years to life in prison.
Barroso, who was convicted of killing Ramirez, received a 20 years to life sentence.
National
Medical groups file lawsuit over Trump deletion of health information
Crucial datasets included LGBTQ, HIV resources
Nine private medical and public health advocacy organizations, including two from D.C., filed a lawsuit on May 20 in federal court in Seattle challenging what it calls the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’s illegal deletion of dozens or more of its webpages containing health related information, including HIV information.
The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington, names as defendants Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and HHS itself, and several agencies operating under HHS and its directors, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration.
“This action challenges the widespread deletion of public health resources from federal agencies,” the lawsuit states. “Dozens (if not more) of taxpayer-funded webpages, databases, and other crucial resources have vanished since January 20, 2025, leaving doctors, nurses, researchers, and the public scrambling for information,” it says.
“These actions have undermined the longstanding, congressionally mandated regime; irreparably harmed Plaintiffs and others who rely on these federal resources; and put the nation’s public health infrastructure in unnecessary jeopardy,” the lawsuit continues.
It adds, “The removal of public health resources was apparently prompted by two recent executive orders – one focused on ‘gender ideology’ and the other targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion (‘DEI’) programs. Defendants implemented these executive orders in a haphazard manner that resulted in the deletion (inadvertent or otherwise) of health-related websites and databases, including information related to pregnancy risks, public health datasets, information about opioid-use disorder, and many other valuable resources.”
The lawsuit does not mention that it was President Donald Trump who issued the two executive orders in question.
A White House spokesperson couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on the lawsuit.
While not mentioning Trump by name, the lawsuit names as defendants in addition to HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., Matthew Buzzelli, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Jay Bhattacharya, director of the National Institutes of Health; Martin Makary, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration; Thomas Engels, administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration; and Charles Ezell, acting director of the Office of Personnel Management.
The 44-page lawsuit complaint includes an addendum with a chart showing the titles or descriptions of 49 “affected resource” website pages that it says were deleted because of the executive orders. The chart shows that just four of the sites were restored after initially being deleted.
Of the 49 sites, 15 addressed LGBTQ-related health issues and six others addressed HIV issues, according to the chart.
“The unannounced and unprecedented deletion of these federal webpages and datasets came as a shock to the medical and scientific communities, which had come to rely on them to monitor and respond to disease outbreaks, assist physicians and other clinicians in daily care, and inform the public about a wide range of healthcare issues,” the lawsuit states.
“Health professionals, nonprofit organizations, and state and local authorities used the websites and datasets daily in care for their patients, to provide resources to their communities, and promote public health,” it says.
Jose Zuniga, president and CEO of the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (IAPAC), one of the organizations that signed on as a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said in a statement that the deleted information from the HHS websites “includes essential information about LGBTQ+ health, gender and reproductive rights, clinical trial data, Mpox and other vaccine guidance and HIV prevention resources.”
Zuniga added, “IAPAC champions evidence-based, data-informed HIV responses and we reject ideologically driven efforts that undermine public health and erase marginalized communities.”
Lisa Amore, a spokesperson for Whitman-Walker Health, D.C.’s largest LGBTQ supportive health services provider, also expressed concern about the potential impact of the HHS website deletions.
“As the region’s leader in HIV care and prevention, Whitman-Walker Health relies on scientific data to help us drive our resources and measure our successes,” Amore said in response to a request for comment from the Washington Blade.
“The District of Columbia has made great strides in the fight against HIV,” Amore said. “But the removal of public facing information from the HHS website makes our collective work much harder and will set HIV care and prevention backward,” she said.
The lawsuit calls on the court to issue a declaratory judgement that the “deletion of public health webpages and resources is unlawful and invalid” and to issue a preliminary or permanent injunction ordering government officials named as defendants in the lawsuit “to restore the public health webpages and resources that have been deleted and to maintain their web domains in accordance with their statutory duties.”
It also calls on the court to require defendant government officials to “file a status report with the Court within twenty-four hours of entry of a preliminary injunction, and at regular intervals, thereafter, confirming compliance with these orders.”
The health organizations that joined the lawsuit as plaintiffs include the Washington State Medical Association, Washington State Nurses Association, Washington Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Academy Health, Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, Fast-Track Cities Institute, International Association of Providers of AIDS Care, National LGBT Cancer Network, and Vermont Medical Society.
The Fast-Track Cities Institute and International Association of Providers of AIDS Care are based in D.C.
U.S. Federal Courts
Federal judge scraps trans-inclusive workplace discrimination protections
Ruling appears to contradict US Supreme Court precedent
Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas has struck down guidelines by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission designed to protect against workplace harassment based on gender identity and sexual orientation.
The EEOC in April 2024 updated its guidelines to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which determined that discrimination against transgender people constituted sex-based discrimination as proscribed under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
To ensure compliance with the law, the agency recommended that employers honor their employees’ preferred pronouns while granting them access to bathrooms and allowing them to wear dress code-compliant clothing that aligns with their gender identities.
While the the guidelines are not legally binding, Kacsmaryk ruled that their issuance created “mandatory standards” exceeding the EEOC’s statutory authority that were “inconsistent with the text, history, and tradition of Title VII and recent Supreme Court precedent.”
“Title VII does not require employers or courts to blind themselves to the biological differences between men and women,” he wrote in the opinion.
The case, which was brought by the conservative think tank behind Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation, presents the greatest setback for LGBTQ inclusive workplace protections since President Donald Trump’s issuance of an executive order on the first day of his second term directing U.S. federal agencies to recognize only two genders as determined by birth sex.
Last month, top Democrats from both chambers of Congress reintroduced the Equality Act, which would codify LGBTQ-inclusive protections against discrimination into federal law, covering employment as well as areas like housing and jury service.
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