Human Rights Principles Need to Guide U.S. Response to AIDS (2008)

On the advent of World AIDS Day, CHLP emphasized that rights violations that impede the response to the AIDS epidemic globally are also a critical problem in the United States.

"[T]he United States' response to AIDS should be a model of commitment to both human rights and the public health. But instead, our HIV/AIDS policies are increasingly ineffective and punitive, because they are driven by ideology and bigotry, not by sound science." For example, U.S. prisons, jails, and detention facilities, like those in post-Soviet countries, provide virtually no comprehensive prevention education, and access to condoms and clean needles for injecting drug users is widely proscribed.

The statement accompanied the release of a declaration, "Human Rights and HIV/AIDS: Now More Than Ever," endorsed by more than 30 leading AIDS organizations around the world and calling for a major shift in the global response to HIV/AIDS.

Download CHLP's press release.