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Worldwide incidence and prevalence rates (Last updated: June 2, 2001) Far and away, sub-Saharan Africa is suffering from AIDS more than any other region in the world. According to the United Nations' latest reports as of December 2000, there are about 25.3 million adults and children living with HIV/AIDS (comprising 8.8 percent of the adult population). About 3.8 million of those living with AIDS in sub-Saharan African are newly infected in 2000, which is slightly less than the number in 1999, giving hope that the incidence of HIV is stabilizing. HIV/AIDS is so prevalent in sub-Saharan African that it accounts for 70.1 percent of the cases worldwide; there were 36.1 million reported cases as of December 2000. By contrast, North America has 920,000 people living with HIV/AIDS, making up just 0.6 percent of the region's population and 2.5 percent of the cases worldwide. As a geographical region, only the Caribbean has HIV incidence making up more than 1% of the population; it has an adult prevalence rate of 2.3 percent. 
  United States statistics (last updated: October 15, 2001)  Africa vs. Pharmaceutical Industry (Last updated: June 2, 2001) Sub-Saharan Africa's dire situation regarding the prevalence of AIDS (about 8.8 percent of the adult population is infected with HIV) has brought the countries there - particularly South Africa - into conflicts with the major pharmaceutical companies that developed and manufacture anti-AIDS drugs. These conflicts led to lawsuits that the drug manufacturers recently decided to end voluntarily; the drug companies have also agreed to lower the price of drugs for these countries. In 1997, South Africa passed a law that would allow the country to purchase brand-name drugs at the lowest rates available that complied with international law agreements. A total of 39 pharmaceutical companies responded with a lawsuit filed in 1998, asserting that the law infringed on intellectual property rights and that drug prices were justified by the development cost and time involved. Drug cocktails in the United States cost about $10,000 to 15,000 a year per patient, but generic drug makers say they could make copycat versions for around $600 a year per patient. Pharmaceutical companies say the costs above the chemical components are necessary to justify the research and efforts that go into developing a drug; one estimate is that it costs $500 million to develop a new drug. Negotiations proceeded over the next three years. In May 2000, five multinational drug companies agreed to drop prices for AIDS drugs. In July 200, the United States offered $1 billion in loans so that 24 sub-Saharan nations could purchased these reduced-price drugs; South Africa rejected this offer, saying that the country needed affordable drugs, not burdensome loans. The tide quickly turned in the spring of 2001. In February, the United States announced that it would not seek sanctions against companies as long as international treaties governing intellectual property were not broken. In March, as generic-drug makers ask the South African government for permission to sell cheap versions of patented AIDS drugs, two leading pharmaceutical companies changed gears dramatically. Merck & Company announced it would sell a low-cost version of its own drug and then Bristol-Myers Squibb (which owned a patent with Yale University) announced that it would not pursue legal actions against generic-drug makers. Finally, in April 2001, the pharmaceutical companies dropped their lawsuit against South Africa, conceding that the country's law did comply with international law agreements. Sources: Rachel L. Swarns, Drug makers drop South Africa suit over AIDS medicine, New York Times, April 20, 2001, page A1. HIV and AIDS (Last updated: June 2, 2001) A long-running and largely underground scientific debate became international news in March 2000, when South Africa President Thabo Mbeki publicly questioned whether HIV causes AIDS. The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is generally considered to be the cause of AIDS. Even though scientists do not yet fully understand the disease process, evidence shows that HIV infection is the sole common factor shared by AIDS cases throughout the world in a wide variety of infected groups. Researchers generally believe that HIV has passed the generally-accepted postulates developed a century ago by German bacteriologist Robert Koch in determining whether a disease is caused by a microbe. But since 1987, retrovirologist Peter Duesberg at the University of California at Berkeley has argued that HIV is actually harmless and does not cause AIDS. Duesberg instead argues that AIDS is caused by other factors such as drug use (illicit drugs as well as AZT, the first drug approved for treating AIDS) and continues to research and argue the point now. His work was the basis for Mbeki's viewpoint and Duesberg has testified before the South African government on his theories. Like Duesberg, Mbeki does acknowledge that acquired immune deficiency exists but he believes that other factors - such as poverty and malnutrition - also result in immune deficiency. AIDS' cause does affect what kind of solutions should follow. If only HIV causes AIDS, then the only solution is prevention and the anti-retroviral drugs made by pharmaceutical companies that until recently charged high prices for the afflicted in sub-Saharan Africa. But if other factors cause AIDS, then one can fight AIDS by undertaking more comprehensive approaches that deal with other social problems. Mbeki publicly withdrew from his stance after widespread criticism, but the South African government continues to reserve some doubts about the causal relationship between HIV and AIDS, most recently in a report issued in March 2001. Sources: Center for Disease Control FAQ on HIV and AIDS, available site; a 1994 Science magazine review of Peter Duesberg's research, by Jon Cohen, available here; Reclaim the Brain background information on Thabo Mbeki's viewpoint, available here. |
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