Sign On to Urge Democratic Leadership to End ADAP Crisis

[edfu]

For those of you who believe that even Internet letters are better than doing nothing, please sign on to this letter to Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid.   It's sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, and the text reads as follows:


Dear Mr. President, Madam Speaker and Mr. Majority Leader,

We write you as citizens and organizations to express our continuing concern that more is not being done to resolve the expanding AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP) crisis. The latest information from the states is that now 2,937 individuals are on the waiting list for medications. We also know that over 300 people have been disenrolled from programs in Ohio and Utah. This upward trend will continue.

The dimensions of this crisis are becoming unbearable. It is heart-breaking to see the safety net that has been pieced together over a generation, fall apart. That is what we are seeing before our eyes. We are grateful that there are additional allocations being proposed for FY 2011 and that DHHS has made available $25 million in immediate relief. However, these resources will not suffice. The community request of the Administration and Congress for an additional $101 million is a minimum investment necessary. For instance, an additional $14M allocation from the legislature of North Carolina enabled the state to remove almost all off the waiting list, and there are those who do not now meet the new eligibility criteria who are disenrolled or still on the waiting list.

Pharmaceutical companies have agreed to provide additional rebates and longer term price containments, which will assist in lowering the growth curve of ADAP programs.

Right at the time that you, Mr. President, and the leadership of Congress have worked so hard to pass comprehensive healthcare reform, we are letting some of our most vulnerable citizens fall out of care or not be able to receive care after finding out that they have HIV. The consequences are unacceptable. For those in care that must stop treatment or have it interrupted, there is a chance that they will become resistant. For those newly diagnosed and needing treatment, we risk losing them to care and increase the risks that they may transmit the virus to others by not being on treatment.

We ask you to do what is necessary to stop this unfolding medical disaster. Please make available the additional $101M that ADAP requires to allow more patients to access medications needed to extend their lives.
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Click here to sign on:

http://www.aidshealth.org/advocacy-policy/current-issues/adap-sign-on.html

[Jody]

I have signed on Edfu...Thanks again for your efforts.

Jody

[WillyWump]

Excellent Edfu! I ahve signed on.

-Will

[leatherman]

excellent!
after I filled in the form, I turned that verbage into actual letters that'll be going into the box tomorrow (i'll be glad for the day when my email is as important as stupid snail mail. LOL but that's just the looking-to-the-future computer geek in me talking). I'll use the magicjack tomorrow and place some calls reiterating this message in person.

thanks for the heads-up!

[J.R.E.]

Signed !

[Jeffreyj]

Thank you so much for shining a light on this issue EDFU!

I may add, it wouldn't hurt to write your Senators, either1
Thanks Again E