E-drug: Disruption of Pfizer shareholders meeting
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ACT UP
Press Release:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 27, 2000
***BREAKING NEWS***
AIDS ACTIVISTS DISRUPT PFIZER SHAREHOLDERS MEETING
(NEW YORK) A dozen activists rushed the stage at the opening of Pfizer's
annual stockholder meeting; the activists left a legal picket outside to
storm the meeting. Before the disruption, shareholders planned to consider
a merger action with Warner-Lambert. The merger would have created one of
the world's largest drug companies.
Activists from ACT UP Philadelphia, ACT UP New York, South Africa's
Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), and Latino AIDS groups distributed
information about Pfizer's "market-driven genocide" to shareholders as
they arrived at today's meetings at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in mid-town
Manhattan. Inside the meeting room, activists scattered pill bottles and
blood money, and used the microphones to demand sustainable, affordable
access to Diflucan (fluconazole), Pfizer's life-saving anti-fungal
medication.
Earlier this month, Pfizer responded to a high-pressure campaign by
activists in the United States and South Africa by agreeing to provide its
anti-fungal drug free to HIV positive South Africans with cryptococcal
meningitis, an otherwise fatal brain infection. So far, the company has
failed to answer similar requests from Nicaragua and other Central
American countries, where an estimated 30,000 HIV positive individuals
have limited access to essential medicines. Uganda has also asked for a
sustainable access program.
"Pfizer doesn't want shareholders to know that the company's exorbitant
prices literally kill millions with AIDS. Pfizer must stop stalling and
commit publicly to providing affordable, sustainable access to this
life-saving drug-in Central America and everywhere else people with AIDS
can't afford Pfizer's killer prices," said Paul Davis of ACT UP
Philadelphia.
"Pfizer is trying to get through these crucial meetings without
addressing the issue," said Mel Stevens of ACT UP NY. "It's time for them
to stop stalling and commit, publicly, to making their drug available and
affordable to any country that needs it."
Fluconazole is used to treat cryptococcal meningitis, an otherwise fatal
brain infection that afflicts roughly nine percent of people with AIDS. It
is also used to systemic fungal infections like esophageal candidiasis.
Without a price reduction or substantive, sustainable plan for improved
access, most of Central America's estimated 30,000 HIV positive
individuals cannot afford the drug. In Guatemala, where the average
monthly wage is U.S.$250, a single 200 mg fluconazole pill costs
U.S.$11.90 in the public sector and U.S.$27.60 in the private sector. In
Thailand, where there is no patent on the drug, the same pill costs
U.S.$0.29.
Activists are challenging Pfizer to reduce the price of the drug or agree
to allow countries that cannot afford it to produce it generically.
"Donations are short-term solutions," said SharonAnn Lynch of ACT UP NY.
"Pfizer needs to take substantial steps to provide for long-term,
affordable access on terms that work for every country."
"The tremendous scope of the AIDS epidemic requires a worldwide price
reduction on fluconazole," said Zackie Achmat of South Africa's activist
group, Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), who attended the protest. "The
donation is a start, but Pfizer is still placing profits before lives all
over the world." TAC has encouraged the South African government to accept
the donation, but has given Pfizer a July 1 deadline for agreeing to a
price reduction.
�more�
In 1999, Pfizer earned U.S.$1.2 billion in revenue from on fluconazole
sales. "For the money they make, we can help so many people that need
these medications. That would not effect their profits," said protester
Jesus Aguais of AID for AIDS, a nonprofit organization that provides
recycled HIV medications to Latin America.
"People with HIV/AIDS in Central America are among the most abandoned of
victims of human rights violations in the world. This action has
tremendous importance," said Richard Stern, a Central American treatment
advocate who made the request that Pfizer make its drug available to the
region. "Until Pfizer agrees to a sustainable affordable access program
for distributing fluconazole to all PWAs who need it in Central America,
many will continue to die. Meanwhile companies reap billions in profits."
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