Brazil Would Rather Have No U.S. AIDS Money than Have Faith-based Restrictions

Blogs our man Stuart Rennie: As mentioned in an earlier post, the Bush Administration attaches faith-based strings to its international AIDS funding. Countries burdened with HIV/AIDS are better placed to receive support if they promise to tackle the epidemic in ways that do not offend delicate neo-conservative sensibilities.

The Administration is opposed to needle exchange programs in US funded AIDS programs in Eastern Europe, Russia, China and South East Asia, and back in February, it announced a new requirement that all US government funded AIDS organizations (both home and abroad) must sign a declaration condemning commercial sex work. Organizations working in unapproved ways with intravenous drug users or sex workers are seen as ‘promoting’ drugs and prostitution, and funded accordingly.

The Brazilian government has read the fine print, and they want out of the program. Toward the beginning of May, it was announced that Brazil has rejected $40 million in AIDS funding in order to send a message to Washington and the world. The director of Brazil’s HIV/AIDS program, Pedro Chequer, has a polite way of putting it:

I would like to confirm that Brazil has taken this decision in order to preserve its autonomy on issues related to national policies on HIV/AIDS as well as ethical and human rights principles."

One might argue that this decision by the Brazilian government is ethically questionable itself, i.e. what if the loss of $40 million results in increased HIV/AIDS-related morbidity and mortality? Does the government in this case have an obligation to swallow its pride, and accept the money, in order to protect some of its citizens?

On the other hand, the Brazilian government’s decision was not top-down: it apparently had non-governmental and grassroots support. And they could always argue that they do not really need $40 million in ideologically tainted (and potentially counterproductive) support anyway. Among low- and middle-income countries, Brazil is one of the success stories in the global struggle against HIV/AIDS.

But not every country has the human rights tradition, the social justice activism, the wherewithal, and frankly, the balls to do what Brazil did this week. It will be interesting to see which other countries are ready, willing and able to follow suit. - Stuart Rennie