Copyright 1999 The Chronicle Publishing Co.
The San
Francisco Chronicle
NOVEMBER 26, 1999, FRIDAY, FINAL EDITION
SECTION: EDITORIAL; Pg. A28; EDITORIALS
LENGTH: 384 words
HEADLINE:
Worldwide AIDS Epidemic Demands Eradication Effort
BODY:
THE BLEAK REPORT that a staggering 2.6
million people will die of AIDS this year should shock the
world into unified action to eradicate the disease.
The report by the
United Nations AIDS program, released in preparation for the
12th annual World AIDS Day on December 1, found that 33.6
million men, women and children have AIDS or are infected with
the HIV virus.
More than two-thirds are in sub-Saharan
Africa, and for the first time, more women and girls are being
infected than men and boys. U.N. officials noted that the HIV infection rate has
doubled in only two years in the former Soviet Union, largely because of shared
needle use by intravenous drug users. The infection rate also is growing in
Southeast Asia, where AIDS as an epidemic has hardly been on
the radar screen.
Since the epidemic began, 16.3 million people -- 13.7
million in sub-Saharan Africa -- have died of
AIDS.
No part of the world is immune, although success
has varied in prevention and availability of drugs that fight
AIDS. Many national leaders, particularly in hard-hit
Africa, have been slow or outright reckless in response to the
disease. Combinations of newly devel oped antiviral drugs have helped cut the
AIDS death rate in the United States in half since 1996. Even
in the prosperous United States, those drugs are prohibitively expensive for
many people, costing more than $1,000 a month. In poorer
countries, the drugs are far out of reach.
Anti-AIDS
activists are attempting to use little-known World Trade Organization rules to
bypass patent protections and sell AIDS drugs at a cheaper rate
to poor countries. The drug industry, not surprisingly, is fighting what they
see as an end-run around patent laws.
The drugmakers argue that leaders
in Africa and elsewhere have made AIDS
eradication too low a priority, and they imply that those countries could find
the money for the drugs if they were so inclined.
Some of those
arguments hold weight, and leaders in a number of countries have been derelict
in using resources or their authority to curb AIDS.
Still, there is no getting around the fact that the drugs are too
expensive for many Third World countries. Drugmakers, doctors, government
leaders and individuals need to work together to eliminate the scourge of
AIDS.
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November 26, 1999 
