AIDS Funding Cut PROTEST @ Baton Rouge City Hall: Thursday, April 13th, 10:30 AM – 11:30 AM

Despite Highest HIV & AIDS Rates in the Nation, Mayor’s Office
defunds respected HIV medical provider caring for over 30% of Baton
Rouge’s HIV/AIDS patients. AIDS activists & patients to protest Mayor
Sharon Weston Broome and the City of Baton Rouge for failing to renew
AHF’s Ryan White Contract.

Protest follows federal lawsuit filed Monday by AHF seeking to
overturn the cuts; failure to renew AHF’s Contract also made AHF
ineligible to participate locally in the federal 340B Drug Pricing
Program.

BATON ROUGE, La.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–A group of AIDS activists, patients, students and medical care providers
will stage a peaceful protest and demonstration in front of Baton
Rouge City Hall (222 St. Louis Street) on Thursday, April 13^th
from 10:30am to 11:30am to protest recent AIDS funding cuts by
the Mayor’s Office and the City of Baton Rouge/Parish of East Baton
Rouge.

The AIDS advocates will protest Mayor Sharon Weston Broome and
the City of Baton Rouge for arbitrarily failing to renew a
federally-funded contract for crucial local HIV/AIDS medical care and
services in Baton Rouge with AHF,
a respected HIV medical provider currently caring for over 30% of Baton
Rouge’s HIV/AIDS patients. On March 2, 2017 Baton Rouge City officials
notified AHF that it would not renew its Ryan White contract for the
2017 – 2018 grant year, an action that also made AHF ineligible to
participate locally in the federal 340B
Drug Pricing Program, a crucial federal, but locally-administered
drug discount program in Baton Rouge.

The protest comes on the heels of a federal lawsuit filed by AHF seeking
court intervention to overturn the cuts. In its lawsuit,
filed Monday, April 10, 2017 in the United States District Court, Middle
District of Louisiana, (Case # 17 cv00229 BAJ-RLB), AHF is
seeking Declaratory and Injunctive Relief against the City of Baton
Rouge/Parish of East Baton Rouge through the City of Baton Rouge
Division of Human Development and Services through restoration of the
contract and AHF’s 340B eligibility. AHF’s lawsuit focuses specifically
on the Parish of East Baton Rouge’s arbitrary, capricious—and AHF
asserts, illegal—denial of renewal of the contract.

First in the Nation: Background on HIV/AIDS in
Baton Rouge, the Ryan White Program

According to the Advocate
newspaper, “Baton Rouge is ranked first in the nation for estimated
HIV and AIDS case rates per 100,000 people, while New Orleans is ranked
third for HIV and fourth for AIDS, according to newly released 2014
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figures.”

In Baton Rouge, AHF operates the following two AHF Healthcare Center
locations:

1) Baton Rouge Healthcare Center, 8281 Goodwood Boulevard, Suite D,
Baton Rouge, LA 70808; and
2) Baton Rouge Azmeh
Clinic and Pharmacy, 4890 Bluebonnet Boulevard, Baton Rouge, LA 70809.

AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the largest global AIDS
organization, currently provides medical care and/or services to over
713,000 individuals in 39 countries worldwide in the US, Africa, Latin
America/Caribbean, the Asia/Pacific Region and Eastern Europe. To learn
more about AHF, please visit our website: www.aidshealth.org,
find us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/aidshealth
and follow us on Twitter: @aidshealthcare
and Instagram: @aidshealthcare

Contacts

AHF Southern Bureau
Imara Canady
Regional Director,
Communications and Community Engagement
+1.404.870.7789 work
+1.954.952.0258
mobile
imara.canady@aidshealth.org
or
AHF
Jessica
Reinhart
Associate Director of Community Outreach
+.1.323.203.6146
mobile
Jessica.Reinhart@aidshealth.org