October 19, 2007
CALLING HRSA OUT
to take control of Puerto Rico's AIDS crisis
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brriiing! briiing! briiing!... |
After Monday's massive fax and phone zap of Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt's office, one thing is for sure: The Secretary knows about the AIDS crisis in Puerto Rico and the growing grassroots movement to force the U.S. to take responsibility for resolving it. Leavitt's office admitted it received calls "every five to ten minutes" on October 15, which advocates chose because it was National Latino AIDS Awareness Day.
The Update has heard talk that high-level meetings are planned this week to address the situation in Puerto Rico, so the fax and phone zap was perfectly timed. Unid@s Dandole Cara Al Sida (UDCAS), a group of Puerto Rican AIDS advocates that want more HHS oversight, is sending a grateful letter to the Latino Commission on AIDS, the Campaign to End AIDS, Housing Works, Community HIV/AIDS Mobilization Project and other groups who organized the effort. The letter reads, "It was very timely and helpful to have all of you engage Mr. Leavitt on National Latino AIDS Awareness Day, given that his office has virtually ignored all of our previous attempts to reach out to him. In the face of years of neglect and denial by the U.S. Department of Health and the Health Resources and Services Administration of our ongoing crisis, your deeds helped make our plight in Puerto Rico impossible to ignore."
HRSA's 'pat answer'The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), which is the part of HHS and is responsible for distributing Ryan White CARE Act funds to the various eligible metropolitan areas (EMAs), responded to Monday's action with a disingenuous statement: "HRSA continues to work with grantees from the Commonwealth and from the Municipality of San Juan to ensure that essential HIV/AIDS services are in place. HRSA has met with officials of the Commonwealth to explore ways to create a more viable fiscal strategy. In addition, HRSA officials continue to work with the mayor's office in San Juan on a variety of possible corrective actions. While HRSA will continue to provide technical assistance to its grantees in Puerto Rico; legislatively, each grantee is ultimately responsible for planning allocating, and administering its funds."
It is not exactly correct that "each grantee is ultimately responsible for planning, allocating, and administering its funds." Leavitt has wide discretion for taking over an EMA, and HRSA has at points taken control in Washington D.C., Baltimore and Orlando, Florida. Puerto Rico desperately needs such oversight. Millions of dollars that could pay for health care and services have been misspent or gone unspent and numerous audits of Ryan White CARE Act expenditures have found mismanagement, fraud and failure to provide basic lifesaving care. New HIV infections, new AIDS diagnoses and deaths from AIDS in Puerto Rico are the seventh highest of any region in the U.S. and continue to rise, particularly among intravenous drug-users.
"HRSA's pat answer that all they can offer is technical assistance is reluctance that borders on negligence," said James Albino, assistant director of public relations and policy for National Minority AIDS Council. "A thinking person would wonder, besides the monetary cost to the federal government, what's keeping them from taking charge? It's the seventh-highest overall infection rate in the country. Why wouldn't you jump at a situation like that?"
Advocates can continue their pressure on HRSA. E-mail jalbino@nmac.org for more information on what you can do to put pressure on HRSA to take real action in Puerto Rico.