§ 6802. — Findings and purposes.
[Laws in effect as of January 24, 2002]
[Document not affected by Public Laws enacted between
January 24, 2002 and December 19, 2002]
[CITE: 22USC6802]
TITLE 22--FOREIGN RELATIONS AND INTERCOURSE
CHAPTER 76--ASSISTANCE TO COUNTRIES WITH LARGE POPULATIONS HAVING HIV/
AIDS
Sec. 6802. Findings and purposes
(a) Findings
Congress makes the following findings:
(1) According to the Surgeon General of the United States, the
epidemic of human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency
syndrome (HIV/AIDS) will soon become the worst epidemic of
infectious disease in recorded history, eclipsing both the bubonic
plague of the 1300's and the influenza epidemic of 1918-1919 which
killed more than 20,000,000 people worldwide.
(2) According to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS
(UNAIDS), more than 34,300,000 people in the world today are living
with HIV/AIDS, of which approximately 95 percent live in the
developing world.
(3) UNAIDS data shows that among children age 14 and under
worldwide, more than 3,800,000 have died from AIDS, more than
1,300,000 are living with the disease; and in 1 year alone--1999--an
estimated 620,000 became infected, of which over 90 percent were
babies born to HIV-positive women.
(4) Although sub-Saharan Africa has only 10 percent of the
world's population, it is home to more than 24,500,000--roughly 70
percent--of the world's HIV/AIDS cases.
(5) Worldwide, there have already been an estimated 18,800,000
deaths because of HIV/AIDS, of which more than 80 percent occurred
in sub-Saharan Africa.
(6) The gap between rich and poor countries in terms of
transmission of HIV from mother to child has been increasing.
Moreover, AIDS threatens to reverse years of steady progress of
child survival in developing countries. UNAIDS believes that by the
year 2010, AIDS may have increased mortality of children under 5
years of age by more than 100 percent in regions most affected by
the virus.
(7) According to UNAIDS, by the end of 1999, 13,200,000 children
have lost at least one parent to AIDS, including 12,100,000 children
in sub-Saharan Africa, and are thus considered AIDS orphans.
(8) At current infection and growth rates for HIV/AIDS, the
National Intelligence Council estimates that the number of AIDS
orphans worldwide will increase dramatically, potentially increasing
threefold or more in the next 10 years, contributing to economic
decay, social fragmentation, and political destabilization in
already volatile and strained societies. Children without care or
hope are often drawn into prostitution, crime, substance abuse, or
child soldiery.
(9) Donors must focus on adequate preparations for the explosion
in the number of orphans and the burden they will place on families,
communities, economies, and governments. Support structures and
incentives for families, communities, and institutions which will
provide care for children orphaned by HIV/AIDS, or for the children
who are themselves afflicted by HIV/AIDS, will be essential.
(10) The 1999 annual report by the United Nations Children's
Fund (UNICEF) states ``[t]he number of orphans, particularly in
Africa, constitutes nothing less than an emergency, requiring an
emergency response'' and that ``finding the resources needed to help
stabilize the crisis and protect children is a priority that
requires urgent action from the international community.''.
(11) The discovery of a relatively simple and inexpensive means
of interrupting the transmission of HIV from an infected mother to
the unborn child--namely with nevirapine (NVP), which costs US$4 a
tablet--has created a great opportunity for an unprecedented
partnership between the United States Government and the governments
of Asian, African and Latin American countries to reduce mother-to-
child transmission (also known as ``vertical transmission'') of HIV.
(12) According to UNAIDS, if implemented this strategy will
decrease the proportion of orphans that are HIV-infected and
decrease infant and child mortality rates in these developing
regions.
(13) A mother-to-child antiretroviral drug strategy can be a
force for social change, providing the opportunity and impetus
needed to address often long-standing problems of inadequate
services and the profound stigma associated with HIV-infection and
the AIDS disease. Strengthening the health infrastructure to improve
mother-and-child health, antenatal, delivery and postnatal services,
and couples counseling generates enormous spillover effects toward
combating the AIDS epidemic in developing regions.
(14) United States Census Bureau statistics show life expectancy
in sub-Saharan Africa falling to around 30 years of age within a
decade, the lowest in a century, and project life expectancy in 2010
to be 29 years of age in Botswana, 30 years of age in Swaziland, 33
years of age in Namibia and Zimbabwe, and 36 years of age in South
Africa, Malawi, and Rwanda, in contrast to a life expectancy of 70
years of age in many of the countries without a high prevalence of
AIDS.
(15) A January 2000 United States National Intelligence Estimate
(NIE) report on the global infectious disease threat concluded that
the economic costs of infectious diseases--especially HIV/AIDS--are
already significant and could reduce GDP by as much as 20 percent or
more by 2010 in some sub-Saharan African nations.
(16) According to the same NIE report, HIV prevalence among
militias in Angola and the Democratic Republic of the Congo are
estimated at 40 to 60 percent, and at 15 to 30 percent in Tanzania.
(17) The HIV/AIDS epidemic is of increasing concern in other
regions of the world, with UNAIDS estimating that there are more
than 5,600,000 cases in South and South-east Asia, that the rate of
HIV infection in the Caribbean is second only to sub-Saharan Africa,
and that HIV infections have doubled in just 2 years in the former
Soviet Union.
(18) Despite the discouraging statistics on the spread of HIV/
AIDS, some developing nations--such as Uganda, Senegal, and
Thailand--have implemented prevention programs that have
substantially curbed the rate of HIV infection.
(19) AIDS, like all diseases, knows no national boundaries, and
there is no certitude that the scale of the problem in one continent
can be contained within that region.
(20) Accordingly, United States financial support for medical
research, education, and disease containment as a global strategy
has beneficial ramifications for millions of Americans and their
families who are affected by this disease, and the entire population
which is potentially susceptible.
(b) Purposes
The purposes of this chapter are to--
(1) help prevent human suffering through the prevention,
diagnosis, and treatment of HIV/AIDS; and
(2) help ensure the viability of economic development,
stability, and national security in the developing world by
advancing research to--
(A) understand the causes associated with HIV/AIDS in
developing countries; and
(B) assist in the development of an AIDS vaccine.
(Pub. L. 106-264, title I, Sec. 103, Aug. 19, 2000, 114 Stat. 749.)
