About 100 activists hit the streets in Center City on Wednesday to protest a proposed funding cut they say could cause a devastating loss to HIV-prevention efforts.

The protesters organized outside of the Park Hyatt at the Bellevue, Broad and Walnut streets, where Gov. Rendell’s Philadelphia office is located, to demand that he restore HIV/AIDS funding for the coming fiscal year.

In February, the state slashed the city’s HIV/AIDS funding by $1.7 million, and proposed cutting State 656 funds — which support prevention and care services — by another $2 million for the coming fiscal year.

The AIDS Activities Coordinating Office estimated that for the remainder of this year, the $1.7-million cut will have amounted to about 120 fewer HIV tests carried out and about 460 fewer people who will be able to access prevention services.

ACT UP member Waheedah Shabazz-El said the state originally proposed a mid-year $2-million slash to Philadelphia’s prevention funding, but conceded to spread some of the cuts to other parts of the state. She surmised that, even though the $2-million cut for next year is proposed for the entire state, it’s likely that Philadelphia will again bear the brunt of it.

“If history repeats itself, and we think it will, Philadelphia’s going to be hit the hardest by this. And that is very unfortunate because more than half of the people in Pennsylvania who are living with HIV live in Philadelphia,” Shabazz-El said. “It’s like pulling troops out of a battle when a war is still going on. It’s a very dangerous move.”

ACT UP predicted that, if the $2-million cut goes into effect, nearly 8,000 people will not receive HIV testing, some 4,000 will not be exposed to HIV-prevention and risk-reduction services and two-dozen full-time jobs will be lost.

“Hundreds, if not thousands, of people could be diagnosed who didn’t need to be [positive],” said ACT UP member Kate Kozeniewski. “Their entire lives will be changed, they’ll have to be on expensive medications for the rest of their lives, when if just a little more money was put into the budget from the beginning, they never would have had to have tested positive.”

Shabazz-El said the demonstration was meant to not only direct the governor’s attention to the crisis but also to show the public how damaging the cut could be.

“This is a public-health issue. Everybody has the right to get information about HIV, but these sorts of cuts are going to cause more people to become infected if we can’t be doing the education that we need to be doing. We don’t have a cure for HIV right now; all we have is education.

“At a time when the president is coming up with a national AIDS strategy and we’re working really hard to get ahead of this domestic crisis, for the state to do this now is just ludicrous and insensitive. It shows a general lack of concern.”

The Pennsylvania Department of Health did not return a call for comment.

Jen Colletta can be reached at jen@epgn.com.