E-DRUG: Drug Deals: Medicines, Development and HIV/AIDS
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[announcement found at BMJ website; copied as fair use. WB]
BMJ 2000;321:1038 ( 28 October )
News
VSO launches campaign to increase access to AIDS drugs
Jason O'Neale Roach, BMJ
Access to medicines to treat opportunistic infections should be
prioritised to meet the needs of people with HIV infection and AIDS
in the developing world, says a new report published this week by
the international charity Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO).
The charity wants the international community to implement the
debt relief commitments made in Cologne in 1999 at a faster rate,
the World Bank to invest more in the pharmaceutical systems of
developing countries, and the drug companies to lower their prices.
The report launches a two year campaign called "Treatment for
Life," inspired by VSO health workers in the field. Health workers
report that common AIDS related infections, such as meningitis
and shingles, which are treatable in the United Kingdom, often
mean blindness, pain, or death in Africa.
"We just sent those patients home to die," said Sue Levi, a former
VSO doctor in Zambia. High prices for drugs and poor resourcing
for health budgets are cited as the two main reasons for lack of
access to treatment in developing countries.
Low public health funding often means that more of the cost of
drugs is passed directly on to the patient. The antibiotic
ciprofloxacin and the cryptococcal meningitis drug fluconazole, for
example, cost more in Africa than they do in countries in the
Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Cryptococcal meningitis affects 20% of patients with HIV infection
or AIDS in Thailand, South Africa, and Zaire.
The World Health Organization estimates that access to essential
drugs could save four million lives each year in Africa and South
East Asia alone.
Drug Deals: Medicines, Development and HIV/AIDS is available on
VSO's website (a 973 KByte PDF file!): www.vso.org.uk
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