WASHINGTON, DC – Today marks the 17th annual observance of the National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day (NBHAAD), a national HIV testing and treatment community mobilization initiative targeted at Black people in the United States and the Diaspora. In advance of NBHAAD, Black HIV/AIDS advocates from across the country traveled to Washington, DC on February 2-4, 2017, to participate in a historic meeting to strategize and chart a course to develop a Black agenda with a comprehensive path forward to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic that continues to disproportionately impact African Americans. Convened by the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC)—in collaboration with the National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Coalition, SisterLove, the National Black Women’s HIV/AIDS Network, and the Global Network of Black People Working in HIV—this meeting served as the first of a series of strategy sessions and convenings for Black leaders to create a comprehensive solution to address and eradicate the HIV/AIDS epidemic among African Americans. The Summit on Black Lives: Black America’s Response to the HIV/AIDS Epidemic will be a yearlong endeavor to ultimately produce a robust action plan to address the current state of the epidemic and its impact on Black lives. 

WASHINGTON, DC – The National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC), the nation’s leading civil rights organization dedicated to the empowerment of Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people, opposes President-elect Trump’s nomination of U.S. Representative Tom Price of Georgia to be the next Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The mission of HHS is to enhance and protect the health and well-being of all Americans by providing for effective health and human services and fostering advances in medicine, public health, and social services. Because of Rep. Price’s vast record of supporting public policies that would devastate the most marginalized in our society, like repealing the Affordable Care Act (ACA), ending Medicare and Medicaid as we know it, and defunding the important health and wellness work of organizations like Planned Parenthood, NBJC strongly opposes his nomination to be the next Secretary of HHS.