Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-12-01-Speech-3-137"
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"en.20041201.14.3-137"2
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".
The scenario that has been illustrated here is not just the result of a natural disaster but represents a tragic synthesis between an aggressive virus and the unbridled drive for profit by single-minded, powerful organisations like the multinational pharmaceutical companies.
While 95% of HIV-positive people in the world already have no access to treatment today, the situation is bound to get even worse after 1 January 2005, when the derogation from Article 31 of the TRIPS agreement expires. India, with a billion inhabitants, and other developing countries will then no longer be able to produce the drugs. Even now, those who produce them cannot sell them to other developing countries or to African countries.
The European Union therefore needs to go beyond all the talking and the statements of principle and make every effort above all to obtain a further derogation from the TRIPS agreement, pending a complete change to it. Not only that: the European Union must also oppose the US practice of holding developing countries to ransom in their bilateral agreements, with the aim of preventing them from exercising their right, laid down in the Doha declarations, to use or import generic drugs.
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS must be supported with an increase in the funds allocated to it. I propose that, on the part of the European Union at least, they should reach EUR 1 billion and that everyone, including Italy, should abide by the commitments that have been made. According to Fortune, the average salary of the top nine pharmaceutical company directors in the world is USD 42 million a year. At the same time, tens of millions of people die without being able to receive treatment.
In the face of such injustice, any kind of moralistic argument should be thrown out. We should remember that a condom is something very useful: a health aid that should be distributed absolutely free of charge. It is part of the toolkit needed to defeat the virus."@en1
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