Several months ago, the President delivered the “State of the Union Address”. To be clear, I had low expectations, really low! I think I may have choked on my popcorn when I heard the President proclaim he was committed to ending the HIV epidemic in the U.S.
Is it possible the beer I was drinking was making me hallucinate? Now, at full attention, I confirmed that he actually said what I thought he had said. Accepting the White House’s commitment to ending the HIV epidemic is a hard pill to swallow, particularly since he escalated his assault against the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) the week after making this announcement. He has recently moved to roll-back health care services for transgender people, a highly vulnerable population at high risk for HIV infection.
Furthermore, the administration has proposed significant budget cuts for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the primary agency that funds and conducts research on HIV, including clinical trials for new treatments and prevention. We’ve also not heard the word “HIV” spoken since he made his announcement. So is this all just talk?
Fortunately, there is a real action plan in place that has been in works by the
