Impact of proposed elimination of HRSA HIV PrEP funding for community health centers
This was sent to all members of Congress:
As part of $767 million of domestic HIV prevention and treatment funding cuts included in the House Labor, HHS Appropriations bill is the total elimination of a program initiated by the Trump administration that is a critical component of the Ending the HIV Epidemic program. The Primary Care HIV Prevention (PCHP) program provides funding to HRSA’s community health centers in the communities most impacted by HIV to conduct activities to support and provide PrEP, which are highly effective medications that prevent HIV.
The program is currently funded at $157 million and supports 411 community health centers in 29 states. (For a listing of all the grantees by state please click here.)
As detailed below, nearly 80,000 people were receiving PrEP from these community health centers in 2022, which represents a 45% increase from the nearly 55,000 people in 2021.
These results demonstrate amazing progress and how beneficial this program can be in providing PrEP to low-income and rural populations as well as those racial and ethnic groups who are most impacted by HIV but are not yet benefiting from this powerful prevention tool. Recent data released by the CDC indicate that while 94% of Whites eligible for PrEP are taking it, only 24% of Latinos are, and only 13% of eligible Blacks are on PrEP.
Unfortunately, all of this progress will be lost if the House version of the FY2024 Labor, HHS Appropriations bill becomes law. On the other hand, the Senate version of the bill retains this funding along with all other domestic HIV prevention and treatment programs.
See here or below for the results and progress that has occurred in each state with this low-cost program that leverages and expands upon existing infrastructure. The average award is around $380,000 per community health center and we know that the prevention of just one HIV case erases the need for over $500,000 of lifetime treatment costs. Every individual on PrEP is taking a step to prevent HIV and this one program provides an avenue for people who have a reason to be on PrEP to obtain it.
Should you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reach out to Carl Schmid, Executive Director, HIV+Hepatitis Policy Institute at cschmid@hivhep.org. Thank you.
