posted on January 2, 2006 09:36:54 PM new
Thanks to the Clinton Foundation, children in Africa will now be able to be treated for HIV/AIDS at a cost of only $39.00 a year compared to $1000.00 a month. Isn't that great news!? (It's estimated that 2.5 million children in Africa are infected with this disease.)
What I don't know is if the drug companies lowered their prices to cost, or if they allowed generics to be produced in Africa. Either way, it's great news.
posted on January 2, 2006 09:47:16 PM new
That's great news!
For what it costs for the war in Iraq they could have fully funded the worldwide Aids programs for 23 years and they could have fully funded global anti-hunger efforts for 9 years.
posted on January 2, 2006 10:03:10 PM new
Thank goodness for people like Clinton and Bono Vox who have really helped put a bigger dent into this epidemic, Kiara. What good souls they are!
Those are amazing numbers, btw. War is like a big vacuum.
posted on January 2, 2006 10:33:51 PM new
It is partially because of a December WTO ammendment that allows its members to sell cheaper generic pharmacuticals to poorer nations at greatly reduced prices.
There had been a waiver in place that allowed it for a couple years but, unsure if it was going to stay in place and wanting to increase favor with the US and UK governemnts, India announced that they were going to place a ban on the manufacturing of the generics in their country. Once the ammendment passed they dropped the subject and it looks like the will be the primary source. They can afford to sell rock bottom when you consider that they recieve HUGE purchasing contracts, minimal research costs and no costly marketing campaigns.
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Never ask what sort if computer a guy drives. If he's a Mac user, he'll tell you. If he's not, why embarrass him? - Tom Clancy
posted on January 3, 2006 12:13:16 AM new
What wonderful news, great program. It will definitely make a difference.
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Two men sit behind bars,one sees mud the other sees stars.
posted on January 3, 2006 05:23:31 AM new
Great News, KD!
And last month, Clinton foundation announced a plan that will help people with HIV/AIDS in Viet Nam also. Over fifty countries now have access to cheaper prices...announced by the Clinton Foundation in 2003.
The Fight Against a Human Tragedy has just Begun
by Bill Clinton
When I left office in 2001, more than 33 million people around the world were living with HIV, with 95 percent of these cases concentrated in developing countries. Since then, despite considerable international effort to combat the problem, that number has grown to more than 40 million even as 15 million men, women and children have died of AIDS. When one takes into account the current HIV/AIDS crisis in Africa and the Caribbean, combined with the potential explosion of infections in China, India and eastern Europe and the fact that AIDS kills 8,500 people every day, we must redouble our efforts to reverse the tide.
I have reached the point in my life where what matters most to me is that no child or young person die prematurely from preventable causes. It is the belief that motivates much of the work of my foundation, especially my work through the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative (CHAI). Every time I meet a child in Lesotho or a mother in rural China or a teenage boy in Kenya – all of whom, once on the brink of death, now glow with the promise of life afforded simply by access to antiretroviral (ARV) medicines – I know we can prevail with will, resources, and organized, consistent effort.
On this World AIDS Day there is some good news. In early 2003 in Africa, ARV drugs reached only one person for every 100 who needed them. Today, thanks to the tireless work of ministers of health, doctors, nurses, community health workers and all those who support them – including the Global Fund, the Bush Administration’s AIDS program, the Gates Foundation, CHAI and many others – more than 500,000 Africans living with HIV now have access to drugs: a tenfold increase. My foundation’s biggest contribution has been to achieve a drop in the price of medicines and diagnostics from $500 or more a year to $150.
Though the world fell short of the United Nations’ ambitious goal of treating 3 million people by the end of 2005, more than 1m people worldwide are being treated today – a positive step. Still, there are 5 million more who need treatment, including 700,000 children.
First, we need to build clinics, strengthen distribution systems and recruit and train healthcare workers. This will only be possible with more money, which is why it is important that the Global Fund get resources to fund a new round of grants next year. To this end, CHAI is extending technical support we give to 17 countries in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean to Ethiopia, Ukraine and Vietnam. We are also expanding the pediatric and rural initiatives we launched in April, recognizing that children and people living in rural areas were being left behind in the rapid pace of treatment scale-up. At the beginning of the year, only 10,000 children (outside Brazil and Thailand) were receiving treatment. My foundation and its partners are doubling that number in one year and are committed to treating 50,000 more next year.
Second, we need to keep the costs of treatment affordable. I am profoundly grateful that a quarter of those on treatment today in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean are benefiting from the drug and diagnostic price reductions my foundation brokered. Still, as access increases, so does the price tag to countries and donors. Small costs, like those for HIV diagnosis, become big when we need to test tens of millions of people. Large costs, like those for the second-line treatments which today cost at least 10 times the price of first-line medicines, could threaten our ability to keep patients on treatment.
Third, we need to redouble our efforts to prevent new HIV infections. Only prevention can end the AIDS pandemic. Of course, we cannot lose sight of the need for a vaccine as a long-term solution and a microbicide in the interim. But we must also remember that AIDS is preventable and behavioral choices can make all the difference. A large majority of those most at risk are still not being reached by education efforts. Too many young people are still being infected by contaminated needles. Too many women are infected during sexual acts that are not voluntary. We must do better by empowering girls and educating adults to change practices that put children at risk. The First Ladies of Africa are announcing today a campaign “to treat every child as your own,” challenging adults to take collective responsibility for the welfare of children.
Sitting in the west, it is easy to think that only the rich and powerful can meet these challenges. The Group of Eight industrial nations gives billions of dollars in aid. Foundations and philanthropists give hundreds of millions more. But everyone has a role. Yesterday in Banda Aceh, I saw again the power of individuals to give relief to victims of the Asian tsunami. They sent blankets and food. They gave money and time – building new homes or caring for the sick. Volunteers have also been at the forefront of responding to hurricanes in America and the earthquake in Kashmir. Individual generosity has made a difference to thousands of lives as the world responded to these natural tragedies, and it can affect millions as we fight AIDS, especially in education, prevention and provision of health care in remote areas.
Every voice matters. So does every dollar and every hour of time you can volunteer. Your generosity supports the tireless work of people whose efforts to fight AIDS are succeeding. We have got a long way to go but we are making progress. Together we can beat this human tragedy.
posted on January 3, 2006 08:13:25 AM new
Another attempt to cover up his Arkansas Aids blood scandal.
Clinton's Arkansas blood scandal
Just when you're certain you've heard about and explored every conceivable crime to which President Clinton has been a party, another bombshell drops.
Like so many other Clinton administration scandals, this one still hasn't been broken in the establishment U.S. press, but it has been covered extensively in Canadian papers -- from the Calgary Sun to the Ottawa Citizen. Those reports have also appeared in WorldNetDaily, bringing this story to the attention of radio talk-show hosts throughout America.
Here's the story: In the early 1980s, while Bill Clinton was serving as governor of Arkansas, his administration awarded a contract to Health Management Associates to provide medical care to the state's prisoners. The president of the company was, naturally, a long-time friend and political ally of Clinton and was later appointed by him to the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission. Later, he was among the senior members of Clinton's 1990 gubernatorial re-election team.
As part of the deal HMA struck with Arkansas, in addition to treating the prisoners, the company collected their blood and sold it. Because of the exploding AIDS crisis, U.S. regulations didn't permit the sale of prisoners' blood within the country. But HMA found a willing buyer in Montreal, which brokered a deal with Connaught, a Toronto blood-fractionator, which didn't know the source of the supplies. The blood was distributed throughout Canada by the Red Cross. Sales continued until 1983, when HMA revealed that some of the plasma might be contaminated with the AIDS virus and hepatitis. The blood was also peddled overseas.
Now the lid has been blown off this scandal by Michael Galster, who conducted orthopedic clinics in the Arkansas prison system during the period the blood was collected. Afraid to tell the story any other way, Galster authored a thinly veiled fictional book called "Blood Trail," which tells the story of an Arkansas governor's role in the mega-scandal -- an Arkansas governor, by the way, who later becomes president.
Galster charges HMA officials knew the blood was tainted as they sold it to Canada and a half-dozen other foreign countries. He also alleges that Clinton knew of the scheme and likely benefited from it financially.
"We now have solid evidence he not only knew about it, but he signed off on it," Galster told the Calgary Sun.
Galster says Clinton organized a payoff plan to various officials, including a judge, to make sure the blood sales continued. He claims millions were made from the conspiracy because between 5,000 and 8,000 units of blood were shipped every week from one prison alone. He has eyewitness reports that inmates were even drawing blood from each other with dirty needles.
So fearful of the dreaded Clinton attack machine was Galster, that he wrote the book under a pen name, Michael Sullivan. But now, as of last week, he has gone public with his story.
"Knowing the nature of politics in Arkansas, I felt unsafely exposed," said Galster.
Galster is understandably frustrated with the unwillingness of the U.S. media to seize on this latest Clinton scandal -- even as the impeachment process begins to move forward.
"If you would just listen to all of the dying people out there, you would understand that there are much greater atrocities than a sexual liaison in the Oval Office," he told the Ottawa Citizen.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police are now investigating the blood trail, but Galster is frustrated that the FBI has not yet conducted a probe. I have some advice for Galster on that front: Don't hold your breath.
If even a small percentage of Galster's accusations are true -- and I have no doubt they are -- this is criminal behavior tantamount to mass murder. No one is certain how many people in Canada and other foreign countries died as a result of infections from the bad blood. It may have been hundreds. It may be thousands.
It's worth pointing out, however, that even if the catastrophe was all the result of innocent mistakes, Clinton is the president who wanted to take over the U.S. health-care system -- to nationalize it and, presumably, run it as efficiently and humanely as he and his friends in Arkansas did in the 1980s.
Can you imagine the kind of holocaust such a system would have wrought on America?
"“More Iraqis think things are going well in Iraq than Americans do. I guess they don’t get the New York Times over there.”—Jay Leno".
posted on January 3, 2006 09:19:12 AM new
Why are the neocons always so negative when good things finally happen ?
They are such gloom and doom people. Never can find anything good to say.
posted on January 3, 2006 09:53:45 AM new
Everyone in the world has committed sins in the past. Why don't you two try to forgive everyone and move forward into the future? Putting a dent into AIDS is the right step forward.
posted on January 3, 2006 10:15:14 AM new
Like I said, maybe he feels a need to relieve some of his guilt and that's why he's doing this.
He DID state after he finally acknowledge his 'affair' 'that he would start doing Christian works'. Go find his own quote, helen, if you don't believe it.
OR maybe he's getting a big salary for doing this too.
But it has been discussed many, many times that his claim that oral sex isn't really sex...might well have influenced MANY teens.
------------
"Some of our education falls short, particularly in this day and age of 'abstinence-only' education," says Tamara Kreinin, the president of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States in New York. "They think they're being good if they have oral sex or engage in other behaviors."
Teens aren't the only ones with a slippery definition of sex. In 1998 President Clinton stated that he "did not have sexual relations with that woman [Monica Lewinsky]" even though he admitted to having oral sex[/i]
something Kreinin says may have factored into teens' views of what oral sex means.
[ edited by Linda_K on Jan 3, 2006 10:48 AM ]
posted on January 3, 2006 10:39:22 AM new
Who or what sp[read AIDS in the United States?
That’s another reason I don’t agree with the “Gay life style”
http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/stats.htm
At the end of 2003, an estimated 1,039,000 to 1,185,000 persons in the United States were living with HIV/AIDS, with 24-27% undiagnosed and unaware of their HIV infection.
Deaths Due to AIDS
In 2003, the estimated number of deaths of persons with AIDS was 18,017, including 17,934 adults and adolescents, and 83 children under age 13
The cumulative estimated number of deaths of persons with AIDS through 2003 is 524,060, including 518,568 adults and adolescents, and 5,492 children under age 13.
posted on January 3, 2006 10:43:45 AM new
Yes, and and I wonder just how much of this 'good works' he's doing is going to OUR OWN HIV/AIDS patients....rather than to other countries.
posted on January 3, 2006 11:21:40 AM new
Colin, the original HIV virus infection, from what I've heard, came from a diseased primate and had nothing to do with gays.
"Yes, and and I wonder just how much of this 'good works' he's doing is going to OUR OWN HIV/AIDS patients....rather than to other countries."
posted on January 3, 2006 11:43:03 AM new
"Yes, and and I wonder just how much of this 'good works' he's doing is going to OUR OWN HIV/AIDS patients....rather than to other countries.""
Now, linda, you know in this, "the world's greatest country", EVERYONE has adequate health care so why would they need Clinton's help ?????
posted on January 3, 2006 11:50:44 AM new
mingo, everyone who deserves it has adequate health care.
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Habla siempre que debas y calla siempre que puedas....
posted on January 3, 2006 01:53:59 PM new
When the repugs post what they consider "good news" and any of us refute it, they say we can't handle good news. However, when we post "good news" they do the exact same thing. Or am I the only one to notice that?
Edited to add: Had BUSH done this, then they'd be clapping and hurraying him all over the place. What hypocrites.
Cheryl
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
[ edited by cblev65252 on Jan 3, 2006 01:54 PM ]
posted on January 3, 2006 03:56:20 PM new
"Sales continued until 1983..."
When should they have realized the blood may have been tainted with AIDS? When did you first hear of AIDS? For me, it was when Rock Hudson died in '85, or just before that. Most people didn't know what AIDS was in 1983. Once they realized it was tainted, they stopped selling it, right?
So what did he do again?
Besides, why would the Canadian company buy blood without knowing where it came from - shame on them. They weren't lied to about its origins, were they?
I can think of plenty of shady things the Clintons did, but I can't see how this fits.
posted on January 3, 2006 04:11:18 PM new
"Colin, the original HIV virus infection, from what I've heard, came from a diseased primate and had nothing to do with gays."
Bullsh*t. It may not be politically correct to say gays were the importers and transmitters of AIDS in the late 70's or early 80's but that's the truth.
Amen,
Reverend Colin http://www.reverendcolin.com
posted on January 3, 2006 04:56:05 PM newHad BUSH done this, then they'd be clapping and hurraying him all over the place. What hypocrites.
Hypocrisy is the claim to fame of the demo party.
Pres Bush did not profited from the sale of AIDS tainted blood but ole Willie sure did. How many have died and how many continue to die because of his greed? No amount of current financial aid will bring back those who have died. No amount of contrition will ever atone willie from his past.
"“More Iraqis think things are going well in Iraq than Americans do. I guess they don’t get the New York Times over there.”—Jay Leno".
posted on January 3, 2006 05:14:40 PM new
::Colin, the original HIV virus infection, from what I've heard, came from a diseased primate and had nothing to do with gays.::
It's one thing to be open minded and tolerant but another to rewrite history. Patient Zero for the US cases was a homosexual flight attendent that covered international flights. All of the original cases in New York back when it was still being referred to as "Gay Cancer" could be linked to the same individual.
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Never ask what sort if computer a guy drives. If he's a Mac user, he'll tell you. If he's not, why embarrass him? - Tom Clancy
