If the U.S. can transform its domestic market for HIV/AIDS drugs, it will certainly transform the world market and make HIV/AIDS drugs more affordable for everyone, everywhere.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Some countries that I go to are still trying to deny that it's happening. In India, 2.1 million people are living with HIV AIDS. India manufactures most of the drugs that are used to cure HIV around the world, which is an amazing, amazing fact that most people don't know.
Today the biggest problem in caring for those with AIDS is no longer mainly a medical or scientific problem. The crisis is access to affordable drugs.
AIDS is a global problem and there should be a global solution found by the entire international community. It is really scary to see and imagine our world fall into pieces because we refuse to share and put in the common vestiges of our civilizations.
A lot has changed since the 1980s, when the United States was a country with one of the greatest numbers of people infected with HIV.
Drug manufacturers could afford to sell AIDS drugs in Africa at virtually any discount. The companies said they did not do so because Africa lacked the requisite infrastructure.
If you look at three diseases, the three major killers, HIV, tuberculosis and malaria, the only disease for which we have really good drugs is HIV. And it's very simple: because there's a market in the United States and Europe.
If a country denies it has AIDS, that country will inevitably become an even greater victim.
AIDS is the biggest challenge, the major disaster facing this country and we would have wished for something more specific and far-reaching.
In fact, it seems to me that making strategic alliances across national borders in order to treat HIV among the world's poor is one of the last great hopes of solidarity across a widening divide.
It will be impossible for us to eradicate HIV as long as any corner of the world is cut off from the education and services that we know helps stop the spread of this disease.