5 nations start fund to help poor overcome AIDS

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 20: Five nations launched an initiative to raise at least 300 million dollars next year to buy generic drugs at steep volume discounts to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in developing countries.

Leaders from France, Brazil, Britain, Norway and Chile, joined by former US President Bill Clinton, unveiled UNITAID, a global purchasing body that will try to negotiate low prices with drug makers.

''None of this would be possible if it weren't the ability UNITAID gives us ... to go out to the people who provide medicine and other life saving equipment and material and say 'You have a guaranteed stream of payment, you will be promptly paid, now give us a higher volume and a lower profit margin,''' Clinton told a news conference at UN headquarters.

France will contribute the most -- about 250 million dollars next year -- from the proceeds of an airline ticket tax that went into effect on July 1. Geneva-based UNITAID will provide drugs of ''assured quality'' to ''the poorest at the lowest prices,'' French President Jacques Chirac said.

Britain will give about 25 million dollars in 2007, a figure that will nearly triple by 2010, said Gareth Thomas, Britain's international development minister.

Norway will put in 20 million dollars to 25 million dollars next year, said Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg.

Organizers said UNITAID next year hoped to be able to buy AIDS drugs for 200,000 children infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It also plans to treat 150,000 children afflicted by tuberculosis and more than 28 million suffering from malaria.

REUTERS