Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report Summarizes Editorials on Bush’s Trip to Africa, AIDS Initiative

Several editorials over the weekend focused on President Bush's trip to Africa and the global AIDS initiative. Bush last week visited Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria. During the trip, Bush promoted several initiatives that focus on Africa, including the five-year, $15 billion AIDS initiative (HR 1298), which he signed into law in May. The global AIDS initiative seeks to prevent seven million new HIV infections, provide care for 10 million people living with the disease and provide treatment to two million HIV-positive people (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 7/11). Summaries of some of the editorials follow:

• Akron Beacon Journal: Following Bush's "dizzying" tour of Africa, one question remains: "How hard will the president fight to preserve both the vision and reality of his Africa policy?" a Beacon Journal editorial asks. The editorial continues, "Even as [Bush] talked about it on the trip, the Republican House was shaving the funding for the HIV/AIDS initiative." The Beacon Journal concludes, "The lasting value of Bush's African trip will be found not so much in the well-crafted message of care and compassion as in the practice" (Akron Beacon Journal, 7/14).
  


• Buffalo News: The United States needs to continue to help fight HIV/AIDS "for the long haul," a News editorial says. During his Africa trip, Bush committed the United States to fighting AIDS, "a humanitarian crusade that everyone, of all political beliefs, ought to support," the editorial says, adding that it will be "crucial" for Bush and "his successors to remain engaged in this effort" to combat HIV/AIDS, which is "nothing less than an African holocaust." The News concludes, "This is going to be a long-term battle that will take much more than five years to win" (Buffalo News, 7/12).
  


• Cincinnati Enquirer: While Bush was in Africa, "a House panel approved only $2 billion of the $3 billion Bush wanted to fund the first year" of the AIDS initiative, an amount that is "not acceptable," according to an Enquirer editorial. The editorial says that the money could be "used right now to build clinics, train workers to take care of AIDS orphans and purchase medicine, among other uses." The Enquirer concludes, "Congress must not hesitate and it must approve the amount in total" (Cincinnati Enquirer, 7/13).
  


• Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Although Bush took to Africa a "ringing message of hope and promise," it is "not being matched by action back home," according to a Journal Sentinel editorial. African governments, including Botswana and Uganda, "know how to fight AIDS; what they don't have is the money to wage the war," the Journal Sentinel says. The editorial concludes that a "major commitment is needed immediately," and "[b]ack home in Washington, [Bush] needs to match those promises with deeds and to use the full influence of his office to do the same. Now" (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 7/13).
  


• New York Daily News: Bush's statements during his trip to Africa about helping to "turn the tide" against HIV/AIDS were not "mere rhetoric," according to a Daily News editorial. The pledges "hol[d] true to Bush's compassionate conservative ideals," the editorial concludes (New York Daily News, 7/13).
  


• New York Times: "Every dollar of Mr. Bush's program is needed along with equally ambitious efforts by other wealthy countries," according to a Times editorial. Although some lawmakers are trying to make "sharp cuts" to the initiative's first-year spending, Bush "needs to fight for the $3 billion annual installment Congress voted [for] in May" and "carr[y] out America's commitment to sustained and generous help in the battle against AIDS" (New York Times, 7/12).