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Date: Thursday, August 7, 1997
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Contact: Health Resources And Services Administration
Press Office, 301-443-3376

HRSA Consolidates $1B Ryan White HIV/AIDS Programs

Health Resources and Services Administration Acting Administrator Claude Earl Fox, M.D., M.P.H., announced today that the nation's lead programs to deliver HIV/AIDS health care and support services for low income and uninsured individuals are consolidated into a new HIV/AIDS Bureau. With an annual budget near $1 billion, the new HRSA bureau houses programs authorized under the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act.

Dr. Fox also announced the selection of Joseph O'Neill, M.D., M.P.H., to head the new bureau. Dr. O'Neill previously served as HRSA's associate administrator for AIDS and acting director of the Bureau of Health Resources Development, now replaced by the new bureau. Other functions previously housed in BHRD, including organ and bone marrow transplantation and health facilities programs, are now consolidated in a new, separate Office of Special Programs, also headed by Dr. O'Neill. HRSA is a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' agency.

"Since 1986, HRSA has invested nearly $4 billion to help communities, cities and states build quality health care and support systems for hundreds of thousands of people affected by HIV," said Dr. Fox. "This consolidation pulls some of the country's leading HIV/AIDS care experts into an organized team able to continue an aggressive and coordinated response to the evolving epidemic."

The new bureau's array of HIV/AIDS programs include grants to all states and territories, and to cities with high rates of AIDS cases. These grants provide low income and uninsured individuals access to quality services, including new drug therapies such as protease inhibitors. Programs also support early intervention and care; train health care and social service professionals; work to reduce HIV transmission to newborns; and assist women, adolescents and other special groups affected by HIV/AIDS.

Since FY 1993, Ryan White CARE Act funding has increased by 158 percent, and assistance for new drug therapies has nearly tripled. The President's FY 1998 budget plan proposes more than $1 billion for Ryan White activities--$40 million over 1997.

"Many federal health agencies are involved in the fight against AIDS, but HRSA"s mission is unique," said Dr. O'Neill. "We work in partnership with hard-pressed communities and states to develop an organized infrastructure responsive to the needs of people affected by the HIV disease."

The new Office of Special Programs provides leadership for the nation's organ and bone marrow donation and allocation efforts, and oversight of the remaining Hill-Burton hospitals required to deliver uncompensated medical care to the indigent. It also manages a program for the Department of Housing and Urban Development to provide mortgage insurance for hospital construction.

Dr. O'Neill holds a faculty appointment at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and volunteers as a primary care physician at the Hopkins AIDS clinic. Before coming to HRSA, he was on the medical staff of the Chase Brexton Clinic, a community-based AIDS facility in Baltimore. A graduate of the School of Medicine, University of California at San Francisco,

Dr. O'Neill also holds advanced degrees in business administration, public health and medical sciences from the University of California at Berkeley. He is board certified in internal medicine.

Dr. O'Neill recently received the 1997 Jane Addams­Howard Brown Memorial Award from the National Lesbian and Gay Health Association in recognition of his service to people with HIV/AIDS and to the lesbian and gay community.

"Dr. O'Neill brings critical leadership to a bureau responsible for one of the federal government's most important health care delivery programs," Dr. Fox said. "He offers superior management capabilities combined with significant experience in national HIV/AIDS program development and community-based clinical services. I'm confident that he will keep HRSA's programs at the forefront of the Administration's determined fight against this changing and expensive epidemic."

Note: HRSA press releases are available on the World Wide Web at: www.hrsa.dhhs.gov

Congress enacted the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act on August 18, 1990. The Act was reauthorized in May 1996.

Programs under the Ryan White CARE Act are designed to improve the quality, organization and availability of care for individuals and families affected by HIV disease. Programs also help public and private entities provide HIV/AIDS health care and support services.

Major CARE Act programs and funding include:

• Title I: assists areas hardest hit by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. In 1997, 49 eligible metropolitan areas received formula and supplemental funding under Title I; since FY 91, $1.9 billion* appropriated.

• Title II: formula funding to all states and territories to improve the quality, availability, and organization of health care and support services for people living with HIV disease;

AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, under Title II, provides funds to states to make protease inhibitors and other therapies available to uninsured and under-insured individuals with HIV; since FY 91, $1.3 billion total appropriated for Title II, including ADAP.

• Title III: competitive funding to public and private gateway.html entities for outpatient

early intervention services; since FY 91, $369 million appropriated.

• Title IV: competitive funding to public and private gateway.html entities for demonstration projects to coordinate services and enhance access to research for children, youth, women and families; pediatric AIDS demonstrations funded FY 88-93 $88 million; since incorporation in CARE Act in FY 94, $113 million.

• Special Projects of National Significance: supports development of new and innovative approaches to delivering care to those affected by the HIV epidemic. SPNS programs explore new care models for national replication; funding until FY 97 was up to 10 percent of Title II appropriation; in amended CARE Act, SPNS is supported by up to 3 percent of Title I-IV appropriation, not to exceed $25 million.

• HIV / AIDS Education and Training Centers: for training health care professionals for specialized HIV care; started FY 87; through FY 95 $125 million; included in CARE Act FY 96, $28 million.

• Dental Reimbursement Program: reimburses schools of dentistry for providing dental care to people with HIV; funded FY 94-95 $14 million; since inclusion in CARE Act in FY 96, $14 million.