The House of Representatives on Wednesday, December 19, passed a $555 billion spending bill for fiscal year 2008, which will fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Department of State, USAID and other global health and aid programs, reports Kaisernetwork.org (kaisernetwork.org, 12/20).

The bill, which is expected to be approved by President Bush, would provide $6.5 billion for national and international health initiatives. Five billion dollars would go to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, up $1.2 billion from last year.

The bill would provide an additional $1.8 billion for global health and child survival programs, with $347 million going to HIV/AIDS programs.

Funding for the AIDS Drug Assistance Programs—government-funded programs that help low-income, uninsured and underinsured HIV-positive people access HIV medications—would increase by $19 million, to $809 million. Also, the measure would lift a ban that restricts the funding of needle-exchange programs in Washington, DC.