Interview with Julie Davids, director of ACT-UP Philadelphia, by Scott
Harris
Proposes Strategies for Prevention and Treatment,
But Lack of Funds Prevents Implementation

As the AIDS epidemic continues to spread around the world, more than
17,000 people engaged in battling the disease gathered in Barcelona,
Spain for the 14th International AIDS Conference in July. Among the
critical issues discussed there by doctors, researchers, activists and
government officials was the urgent need to develop more effective
prevention programs and making life-saving drugs available to treat
millions of those infected in impoverished nations.


Since the first cases of AIDS appeared in 1981, more than 20 million
people have died from the disease. But most of the 40 million people who
are currently living with the HIV virus will die without receiving
specialized drugs now effectively used in the world's wealthy countries.
Both former South African President Nelson Mandela and former U.S.
President Bill Clinton addressed the conference. In a rare admission,
Mr. Clinton stated in an interview at the conference that he regretted
not doing more to control the spread of AIDS while he was in the White
House.


Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with Julie Davids, director of the
Philadelphia chapter of ACT-UP, the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power and
member of the HealthGAP Coalition, who attended the Barcelona
Conference. She examines some of the critical issues discussed at the
gathering and describes a protest against Bush administration policies
directed at Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson who tried
to speak to those meeting in Barcelona.


Julie Davids: Tommy Thompson, who was scheduled to speak as part of a
panel of leaders was the first speaker and he was shouted down.
Activists took the stage, took the microphone and would not let him
speak. (Activists) had whistles in the audience and made it impossible.
He delivered his speech, but as some papers reported, the only people
that could hear him were the security guards flanking him.


I think it's important to recognize that this has happened before. About
10 years ago in San Francisco, Louis Sullivan, who was the Health and
Human Services secretary under Reagan, was also booed down and not
allowed to speak at that conference. I think it shows that both in the
United States and internationally, people have had enough of the excuses
of the United States. Thompson had the audacity to come to the
conference not apologetic, not saying we can do more, but to actually
try to assert that the United States has done more than any other
country in the fight against global AIDS. And people just wouldn't let
it stand.


One of the most amazing things that happened was that after the
protesters left the stage many people in the audience gave them a
standing ovation. I think it spoke to the widespread support for this
action, the frustration that people feel not only with the neglect of
the U.S. government towards the crisis, but the active work of the U.S.
government to stand in the way of solutions that are broadly endorsed
for combatting global AIDS.


In addition, domestically the U.S. government continues to refuse to
fund needle exchange and the Bush administration is pushing
abstinence-only measures. And in fact in the United States we have
people who can't get anti-HIV treatment. There's about 10 percent of
people who need U.S. support for AIDS drugs that can't them in any other
way, are not able to get them at this time because the AIDS drug
assistance program is so underfunded.


Between The Lines: I wonder if we could turn our attention to some of
the core issues that were discussed at the Barcelona conference, among
them: getting affordable life-saving medicines to treat people with HIV
and AIDS living in impoverished, developing nations where there
currently is no access. Certainly the role of drug companies and the
role of profits and patents has come under the scrutiny of many
activists around the world.


Julie Davids: That's right. I think what we saw at that conference in
Barcelona was that treatment can happen and that a major obstacle
remaining is price. And if we look at the supposed best efforts of the
multinational drug companies to lower their prices, it's still about six
times as expensive as generically produced medication.


And so the U.S. government and other G8 countries are still trying to
push patent regulations to limit access to generically produced drugs.
In addition to it being misguided, I think we need to recognize that
there's a real practicality of having drugs not bound by patents.
There's a generic manufacturer in India that's producing three AIDS
medications in one pill that you'll never see in the United States
because there's three different companies that own the patents in the
U.S. So (the Indian manufacturers) actually make HIV treatment easier.
The patents even in wealthy countries are standing in the way.


Between The Lines: Julie, could you tell us the status of the global
AIDS pandemic? Because the AIDS epidemic has received a lot less
attention in recent years, waning attention from the nation's news
media, it certainly has resulted in things you were just touching upon:
the lack of political support to make funds available for those
suffering throughout the world with this disease that can be treated but
isn't because of lack of funds, patent complications and the rest. But
maybe you could give us your overall assessment of where the AIDS
pandemic is.


Julie Davids: Where it is, is worse than anyone thought it was going to
be, honestly. Even the gloom-and-doom predictions of UNAIDS, which is a
U.N. group tracking global AIDS from 10 years ago, were off the mark.
It's worse than people thought it would be. Whether you look at Africa,
where in some nations one in four people is infected and that's from all
walks of life -- from children, to teachers, to truck drivers, to the
globe-trotting elite, we're looking at these outrageous levels of
infection -- to newer epidemics in Russia and the former states of the
Soviet Union, where injection drug use has spread the epidemic into the
millions just over the last five years. Or in China, where it's been
very hard to have the government give any honest assessment of HIV-AIDS,
but it's believed that there's an out-of-control epidemic not just from
tainting of the blood supply, but from drug use from sex work and other
things of an economic nature.


I think what we see is the global epidemic continues to track along the
lines of social disruption, along lines of poverty, along lines of war
and gender inequality to shine like a beacon on the increasing problems
across the globe, and unfortunately, it's getting much, much worse.


Contact the HEALTHGAP Coalition by calling (215) 474-9329 or visit their
Web site at:  http://www.healthgap.org (www.healthgap.org)

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Scott Harris is the executive producer of Between The Lines. This
interview excerpt was featured on the award-winning, syndicated weekly
radio newsmagazine, Between The Lines (www.btlonline.org), for the week
ending July 26, 2002.
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