John F. Galbraith is the president and chief executive officer of the Catholic Medical Mission Board, a not-for-profit faith-based association founded in 1928. The CMMB does not receive funds from the Catholic Church, but it receives an annual grant from the U.S. government. Galbraith will discuss the role of religion in the global fight against HIV/AIDS at the International Prayer for Peace Conference, hosted here at Georgetown.
A recent article in the Washington Post reported that a senior cardinal, Carlo Maria Martini, stated that condoms are “a ‘lesser evil’ in the fight against AIDS.” What do you think this stance means for the future of Catholic involvement in AIDS prevention?
In the developing world where people are looked at day in and day out, condoms are not an issue. To the workers in faith-based hospitals and clinics, the challenge of keeping people alive supersedes anything else. There are 10 commandments, and one commandment is, “Thou shalt not kill.” Certainly a married woman who is HIV negative and knows her husband is HIV positive is risking her life by having sexual relations with her husband.
Is the Western debate against the use of condoms as a means for HIV prevention valid?
People in the third world don’t have time to deal with whether or not a condom is used. The philosophical argument isn’t something you deal with. I’m not saying that people in the U.S. can’t have that argument, but if people in the U.S. had to deal with issues in Africa or Haiti, the reality of what we would be debating would be very different. In the course of any given month in the third world, there are 20-30 children born HIV positive in one month in one hospital. If you look at the sheer numbers, you start to get an idea.
Georgetown’s director for Reproductive Health, Victoria Jennings, said that members of the Catholic Church ”’preach’ about pre-marital abstinence and marital fidelity” and deems this the “social control” approach. How is the CMMB included in this dialogue?
With the help of our partners, we run hospitals and clinics. We don’t give sermons in parishes. Sometimes we work in the community, for prevention messages. Certainly when we do that, the message is, the only 100% proven way to prevent getting HIV/AIDS is to avoid sexual contact except in marriage with a single partner. Having said that, when a person comes in and is sick, we’re not preaching to that person. The way you fight HIV/AIDS is ABC: abstinence, be faithful, and if that doesn’t work, use condoms.
The CMMB fights the HIV/AIDS pandemic using medical supplies donated by pharmaceutical companies. Donations totaled over $175 million for the fiscal year 2005 alone. How has your group addressed stigma, prevention, and gender inequality?
Out of the $175 million in donated pharmaceuticals, probably 95 percent has nothing to do with HIV/AIDS work, that’s for primary medicine. In the way the U.S. government gives out the money [for grants], 55 percent is treatment, 45 percent prevention and care. When we receive the funding from the government, we receive treatment money. We’re not allowed to use treatment money for anything but treatment. The reality is that in these clinics, in the highest prevalence areas, 4 out of 10 women are HIV positive. This changes from area to area, country to country. Those who are HIV negative get prevention so they do not become HIV positive.
How will faith-based organizations expand in order to continue the battle against the HIV/AIDS pandemic?
For us to expand our work, we would have to continue to get major government funding. The nature of treating it, if you put someone on antiretrovirals, you’re committing to providing the antiretrovirals for the rest of that person’s life. No not-for-profit can take that financial commitment on. Unless U.S. government funding comes, you can never do that with just private money alone.
