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Profits take precedence over lives

Date published: 1/12/2003

By RICK MERCIER

IN HIS CRAMPED OFFICE, situated off a courtyard on the grounds of Nakuru Provincial General Hospital in Kenya's Rift Valley, Sammy Kariuki counsels distraught souls who have been handed a death sentence: test results confirming they're HIV positive.

The work keeps him busy. In Nakuru, as in the rest of Kenya, the HIV/AIDS pandemic is exacting a horrific toll. In recent years, one in four expectant mothers in the Nakuru area has tested positive for HIV. Kenya, you'll hear it said in this nation of 30 million, buries 700 people a day because of AIDS. The East African nation has 1 million children who have been made orphans by the disease; that figure is expected to double by 2010.

But Sammy doesn't view his country's AIDS crisis in terms of these staggering numbers. He brings a personal knowledge to his vocation: Seven years ago he found out that he, too, belonged to the legion of the HIV positive. Today, he says, his clients draw strength from his example. "It creates hope that they can still live, can still make it."

Yet Sammy, like the people he counsels and like millions of other Africans, can't afford the antiretroviral drugs (which cost between $1,000 and $2,000 per year in Kenya) that can slow the progression of AIDS. And so as I wrap up my visit with Sammy, he asks for my notepad and writes down his contact information--so that if I learn of someone in the States who's able to send antiretroviral medicines, I'll know how to reach him, he explains. I respond with a feeble nod and take my leave.

Just days after I met with Sammy last month, it looked like the members of the World Trade Organization had beaten a fast-approaching deadline and worked out a deal to allow poor countries to disregard patents and import less-expensive generic drugs for treating diseases such as AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria.

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Date published: 1/12/2003