Visiting Mission Neighborhood Centers; Fighting HIV/AIDS with a National Strategy

Visiting Mission Neighborhood Centers
On Monday, I spoke with children, parents, seniors, and other community members at Mission Neighborhood Centers, Inc. (MNC) on Capp Street in San Francisco. MNC provides multigenerational, community-based services to ensure that: our children have a safe, clean place to thrive; parents can learn parenting skills and can go to work knowing that their children are in good hands; and grandparents can be treated with the respect they deserve.

Congresswoman Pelosi speaks with children at the MNC in San Francisco.

MNC received funding in the Recovery Act for its Head Start program, preventing devastating cuts to the Center’s services for children from low income families. The Center also hired 16 new employees with funding from the Jobs Now program, enabling them to expand their range of services both to children and seniors.

Fighting HIV/AIDS with a National Strategy
The Obama Administration’s National HIV/AIDS Strategy represents the nation’s first comprehensive plan to reduce the impact of HIV/AIDS in this country. The strategy sets specific targets and provides detailed implementation information on the steps we must take to increase access to high quality HIV/AIDS care and treatment, decrease new HIV infections, and reduce HIV-related health disparities.

This new strategic plan builds on the extensive work of the Democratic Congress to strengthen HIV/AIDS care, prevention, and research at home and around the world. Since President Obama took office, we have lifted the ban on federal funding for syringe exchange, ended the travel ban for people with HIV/AIDS, and eliminated discretionary funding for ineffective abstinence-only education. We also reauthorized the Ryan White Act, providing a lifeline of care, treatment, and support services to low-income Americans with HIV/AIDS.

Under the Democratic-led Congress, funding for the Ryan White Act, CDC HIV prevention activities, NIH HIV/AIDS research, and Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS has jumped by more than $500 million. And with the passage of health insurance reform, we dramatically increased access to Medicaid for people with HIV, improved Medicare Part D for people participating in the AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, ended discrimination based on pre-existing conditions, and ended annual and lifetime caps on health benefits. We simply cannot rest until we have done everything we can to prevent new infections. We cannot rest until every person living with HIV has access to the care and medications they need to stay healthy. And we cannot rest until we have a cure.

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