Wait, we spent $1.4 billion dollars just to tell people not to have sex?
Jesus.
EDIT: Oh, we only spent 350 million telling people not to have sex. That's much better.
It was cumulatively $1.4 billion over the past decade ish.
Ediy: at least i think it says that... I'm not sure anymore
$1.4 billion over 9 years from 2004 to 2013
Oh so 4.2 billion total, with 1.4 going to these abstinence programs. Whoops.
since 2004, the overall program has spent much more. I edited the OP a bit to try to eliminate misunderstanding. Now that I read it again, I realize I didn't make it as clear as I could have.
The "misleading" part is that most of the overall PEPFAR aid program itself was not about abstinence, but rather about stuff that actually works.
The entire PEPFAR program as a whole from when it started until now has spent tens of billions of dollars. The abstinence education part of that has totaled $1.4 billion.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/21/opinion/21tutu.html (the funding for stuff that works was pretty substantial)
Since 2004, Pepfar has spent $19 billion to help distribute anti-viral treatments to about 2.5 million Africans infected with H.I.V.
http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/35/5/856.abstract?sid=fd96f17d-72c6-43b6-8b7d-de1f4d5c1365 (the funding for stuff that doesn't work was
relatively small, but that's still a lot of fucking money over the years.)
The Presidents Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) has been the largest funder of abstinence and faithfulness programming in sub-Saharan Africa, with a cumulative investment of over US $1.4 billion in the period 200413.
We found no evidence to suggest that PEPFAR funding was associated with population-level reductions in any of the five outcomes. These results suggest that alternative funding priorities for HIV prevention may yield greater health benefits.