On October 12th and 13th, 2011, Project Inform will hold a think tank in Washington, DC, entitled “Meeting the goals of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy in the context of Affordable Care Act implementation and Ryan White reauthorization.” This meeting will convene 40 experts to strategize how best to meet the care, treatment, and prevention goals outlined in the National HIV/AIDS Strategy in the context of reauthorization of the Ryan White Program in 2013 and implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2014. The group will also discuss how meeting the goals could be hampered by the current challenging and rapidly changing political and economic environment and debt reduction negotiations.
President Obama’s National HIV/AIDS Strategy, released in July of 2010, proposes bold goals for ensuring access to care and treatment for all people living with HIV/AIDS in the United States and sharply decreasing new HIV infections. Full and careful Implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the landmark health care reform law signed last year, is critical to realizing these goals. In addition, the Ryan White Program, which funds health care and treatment services for low-income people with HIV, expires on September 30, 2013, and will need to be reauthorized. The role of Ryan White, and how it could best fill in gaps in services not covered by the ACA, needs a great deal of discussion in the community so that a proactive reauthorization strategy can get developed. This think tank will provide an opportunity for thoughtful strategizing and brainstorming to move us towards a common advocacy effort to ensure that the goals in the Strategy are met.
Project Inform will provide a report on the think tank’s outcome in November. For more information, contact Ryan Clary at rclary@projectinform.org