PHA-Exchange> Women's Rights NGO Raises Strong Concerns over Nomination of Randall Tobias to Head USAID

[Sarah Shannon]

Dear friends,
Given the effect USAID has over health and development programs in much of 
the world, I wanted to share this with you.  For more information, please 
contact our friends of PHM at the Center for Health and Gender Equity.
Sarah


Press Release: Women's Rights NGO Raises Strong Concerns over Nomination of 
Randall Tobias to Head USAID
Jodi L Jacobson, Gender Health
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Women's Rights NGO Raises Strong Concerns over Nomination of Randall Tobias 
to Head USAID

The nomination of Ambassador Randall Tobias to head the United States 
Agency for International Development (USAID) deepens concern over the 
United States' commitment to long-term international development strategies 
that serve the needs of the most vulnerable, particularly women and girls 
worldwide. The Ambassador currently is head of the Office of the GlobalAIDS 
Coordinator (OGAC) at the Department of State.

"Under Ambassador Tobias' watch at OGAC, the U.S. has carried out a 
controversial approach to HIV prevention that goes far beyond any 
congressional mandate, by, among other things, limiting access to condoms 
even in generalized epidemics and hampering effective outreach to sex 
workers," stated Jodi L. Jacobson, Executive Director of the Center for 
Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE).  "Because Tobias has shown himself 
vulnerable to pressure by the extreme right at OGAC we feel his nomination 
to head USAID at this critical moment is cause for great concern."

"As Administrator of USAID, Ambassador Tobias will oversee a large 
portfolio of development programs that affect the health and rights of 
women and girls," stated Jacobson. These programs include critical efforts 
to expand and strengthen reproductive health and family planning programs 
worldwide; programs which are a matter of life and death in countries where 
complications of pregnancy, childbirth, unsafe abortion, and HIV infection 
are the leading killers of women ages 15 to 49. Under previous 
Administrations, USAID was arguably the leading global agency in developing 
effective, evidence-based programs to address these problems, and in 
providing technical assistance to countries in every region.

"However, under President Bush, the extreme right in the United States has 
been given 'carte blanche' in controlling both domestic and international 
policies and programs addressing reproductive and sexual health, including 
HIV prevention," asserted Jacobson.

"Tobias has been all too willing to accede to the demands of the extreme 
right in developing policies and programs based on ideology rather than 
evidence," stated Jacobson.

For example:

-- Ambassador Tobias has put in place HIV prevention policies focused on 
"abstinence-only-until-marriage" and "secondary abstinence." These 
strategies go far beyond any Congressional mandate, despite the vast and 
mounting evidence that such programs leave large segments of the population 
at immediate risk of HIV infection. In Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania 
between 55 and 71 percent of those ages 15 to 24 are already sexually 
active, yet under current U.S. policies this group gets no information, 
skills, or training on safer sex strategies. In other countries in 
sub-Saharan Africa, new infections are rising fastest among married women, 
further demonstrating that abstinence-until-marriage HIV prevention 
programs have no relationship to common modes of HIV transmission.

-- Ambassador Tobias has made inaccurate public statements on the role of 
condoms in reducing the spread of sexually transmitted infections, 
including HIV. In a March 2004 Congressional hearing, Tobias testified that 
the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) had reported 
that condoms were ineffective in preventing the spread of HIV for the 
general population. In response, the President of LSHTM wrote Ambassador 
Tobias,"[W]e cannot find the source for this claim. Indeed, there has been 
a steady stream of publications from LSHTM attesting to the importance of 
condom promotion as a part of any comprehensive HIV prevention strategy. 
"Yet the Ambassador repeated the same claim in another Congressional 
hearing in May 2004. In another unsupported statement in April 2004, he 
asserted that "[s]tatistics show that condoms really have not been very 
effective."

-- Ambassador Tobias has funded questionable organizations despite their 
lack of technical competency. Tobias approved a $10 million grant for HIV 
prevention to the Children's Aid Fund (CAF), despite the fact that the 
proposal submitted by CAF failed to pass review by an expert technical 
committee. The organization is run by Anita and Shepherd Smith, supporters 
of President Bush. Anita Smith also serves as the Chair of the President's 
Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS. Under OGAC, many other, similar 
organizations, including those that qualify simply because they are 
"faith-based," are now receiving large sums from the U.S. government 
without adequate mechanisms for monitoring their use of U.S. taxpayer funding.

-- Programs focused on the needs and rights of women are largely absent 
from the OGAC strategy, despite the fact that the highest rates of new 
infections are in older adolescent girls ages 15 and above and in married 
women in their twenties and thirties. The female condom -- the only 
currently available female-controlled method of HIV prevention -- is 
largely ignored by OGAC.

"Ambassador Tobias' willingness to foster an ideological agenda under OGAC 
raises serious questions about his treatment of other sensitive issues that 
will fall within his purview at USAID, such as broader reproductive health 
and family planning programs," stated Jacobson. "Such programs remain a 
primary target of the extreme right in the United States. Given his past 
history, we have no confidence that Ambassador Tobias would stand up to an 
ideological assault on these programs."

Before confirming him for this post, "the Senate must ensure that 
Ambassador Tobias is committed to non-partisan humanitarian aid programs 
that seek the best methods -- and use the best people -- to improve health 
and reduce poverty worldwide. Humanitarian aid programs should respond to 
needs of people, not politicians," Jacobson concluded.

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The Center for Health and Gender Equity is a U.S.-based non-governmental 
organization focused on the effects of U.S. international policies on the 
health and rights of women, girls, and other vulnerable populations in 
Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

If you have difficulties viewing this message please e-mail 
change at genderhealth.org.

CONTACT: Jodi L. Jacobson
Telephone: 301-270-1182
Mobile: 301-257-7897
Website: www.genderhealth.org

Sarah Shannon
Executive Director
Hesperian Foundation
1919 Addison St. #304
Berkeley, CA. 94704
(510) 845-1447 ext. 206