Press Advisory, MEDIA STUNT Friday April 21, 12 noon

[Guest guest]

Stop HIV/AIDS in India Initiative (SHAII)

www.shaii.org

Press Advisory, 18 April 2006

MEDIA STUNT Friday April 21, 12 noon

IMF and World Bank Fail Health Inspection!

Institutions Now Slated For Closure

Peoples’ Department of Health finds IMF/World Bank hazardous to public health

Contact: Dr. Vineeta Gupta, Stop HIV/AIDS in India Initiative, + 1 202-789-0432, Ext. 207 Email: guptahr@...; or Hope Chu, 50 Years Is Enough Network: +1 202 463 2265/+1 303 667 6613; Morrigan , Mobilization for Global Justice: +1 202 258 1822

Attention Photo Editors and Photographers: MEDIA STUNT

Activists will stage a theatrical event/press stunt on Friday, 21 April 2006, at noon in front of IMF headquarters, H and 19th Sts NW, Washington DC.

Who: People’s Department of Health

What: Press stunt entitled, “IMF/World Bank Get Failing Health Report”

Where: IMF headquarters, H and 19th Sts NW, Washington DC

When: Friday, 21 April 2006, Noon

WASHINGTON – Next Friday, as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank hold their annual spring meetings, health inspectors from the People’s Department of Health will declare the IMF and World Bank a public health and present the institutions with an order to close. The Department will cite numerous violations, including the promotion of policies that have devastated the quality, availability, and accessibility of health care in impoverished countries around the world, including India.

The health inspectors point to the institutions’ tunnel vision approach to economic policy as a primary culprit.

The IMF sets strict targets for reducing inflation and paying down the fiscal deficit of the countries in which it works. In order to reach these targets, countries institute budget ceilings that are too low to allow adequate spending on health. Many countries are prevented from expanding their budgets to allow them to hire more health workers, despite HIV/AIDS and other crises.

In India, World Bank projects are promoting privatization and imposition of user-fees in the state health care systems. It results in poor people loosing what ever access they have to health care and adding to the HIV/AIDS pandemic in India.

Impoverished countries’ foreign debt burden is also exacerbating health care crises around the world.

People’s Department of Health Inspection Team: 50 Years Is Enough Network, Africa Action, Jubilee USA Network, Mobilization for Global Justice, and Stop HIV/AIDS in India Initiative.

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" The future depends on what we do in the present." Gandhi