Copyright 1999 The Washington Post
The Washington
Post
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August 11, 1999, Wednesday, Final Edition
SECTION: OP-ED; Pg. A19
LENGTH: 611 words
HEADLINE:
Facing a Global AIDS Crisis
BYLINE:
Princeton N. Lyman
BODY:
The toll from the
HIV/AIDS epidemic is becoming more evident each day. Last year
close to 2 million people worldwide died from the disease. The number of
AIDS orphans is horrifying: 8.3 million children, according to
UNICEF.
Less well reported is the growing economic impact. In Zimbabwe,
companies report training seven workers for each job, as the death roll is so
great. In Zambia, colleges graduated 300 new teachers last year; but
AIDS took the lives of 600. In South Africa,
analysts predict that the epidemic could kill up to 10 percent of the mining
work force each year. AIDS will drive up the payroll costs of
this critical industry in South Africa by 45 percent, an
industry already racked by falling world prices.
While the impact today
is greatest in Africa, the rate of spreading infection in South
Asia is one of the most rapid in the world, threatening havoc in that already
volatile region within a decade.
Faced with this devastating epidemic,
African countries have become increasingly frustrated with the gap between the
industrialized countries' ability to treat AIDS patients, and
thus lower death rates, and their own lack of the resources to do so. This has
led to attacks on the patent rights of pharmaceutical companies, by South
Africa in particular, and challenges to these rights by others
in the World Health Organization.
Led by Zimbabwe, countries are arguing
that health should take priority over trade or intellectual
property protection. The South African challenge is technically not
aimed at AIDS medicines per se. But the confrontational
attitude behind these challenges has its origins in the AIDS
crisis.
Most African countries would be unable to administer the complex
use of AIDS "cocktails" even if the price were within reach.
But a new development has offered the prospect of a partnership between the
international community, pharmaceutical companies and African and other nations
under siege. This is the discovery of a relatively simple means of interrupting
the transmission of HIV from an infected mother to the unborn child. At least
this much could be addressed now.
Such a partnership would involve major
donors, such as the United States, to cover the administrative costs, UNICEF to
ensure proper ministration of the medicine, the pharmaceutical companies to make
this relatively low-cost medicine available free or at least at cost, and the
governments of Asia and Africa to launch and oversee the
program.
This is still a small step toward controlling this disease.
Some day, a much greater partnership will be needed to administer a vaccine,
once it is developed. For now, however, pharmaceutical companies, which have
been notoriously insensitive to the underlying crisis when vigorously defending
their patent rights (Bristol-Myers being a welcome exception), can demonstrate
concern in a tangible way.
For Vice President Al Gore, dogged by
protesters over his alleged defense of the pharmaceutical industries' claims
against South Africa, this would be a most appropriate
initiative to lead. It would have far more impact than the extra $ 100 million
request for HIV/AIDS he recently announced with Archbishop
Desmond Tutu, as welcome as that is.
The HIV/AIDS
epidemic is perhaps the most serious source of future social and economic
upheaval in large parts of the world today. It demands initiatives far greater
than anything done so far. A public-private partnership as described here could
be the forerunner of the kind that eventually will be needed.
The writer, a former U.S. ambassador to South
Africa, is a visiting fellow at the Overseas Development
Council.
LOAD-DATE: August 11, 1999
