U.S. Rejects U.N. Plea to Raise Its Contribution to AIDS Fund

U.S. AIDS czar Randall Tobias on Wednesday rejected a plea from the United Nations that the United States increase to $1 billion its yearly contribution to the Global Fund, saying, “It’s not going to happen.”

Tobias said that so far the bulk of the money collected by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria was “sitting in the World Bank in Geneva.”

He said U.S. money should be focused instead on the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, because “we need to get that money to work” and the program was the fastest way to do so.

Tobias rejected the request from U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan shortly after speaking at a special session of the 15th International AIDS Conference here, during which he defended U.S. AIDS policy.

The Bush administration has been under repeated attack this week from activists and world leaders, such as Annan and French President Jacques Chirac, who say the U.S. is not contributing its fair share to the global anti-AIDS effort. They also say U.S. policy is putting too much emphasis on abstinence rather than on condoms and blocking Third World countries from producing their own versions of drugs patented by major pharmaceutical companies.

Tobias’ speech was delayed more than 10 minutes by activists holding posters and shouting: “He’s lying! Millions dying!”

Once his speech started, Tobias noted that the United States would spend $2.4 billion this year fighting AIDS, “nearly twice as much as the rest of the world’s donor governments combined.”

He admonished both the activists and conference attendees to stop focusing on what they thought the U.S. positions on condoms and drug patents were and begin working together to solve the AIDS problem.

“HIV/AIDS is the real enemy. The denial, stigma and complacency that fuel HIV/AIDS -- these are real enemies too. It is morally imperative that we direct our energies at these enemies, not at one another,” he said.

“Preventing AIDS is not a multiple-choice test,” he added. “Abstinence works. Being faithful works. Condoms work. Each has its place.”

Speaking to a group of editorial writers and reporters after his speech, Tobias noted that the United States was “buying more condoms than at any time in history.... If there are people who want to attribute some motive to us other than good science, be my guest.”

Tobias said the United States planned to donate $200 million to the Global Fund next year, “but it will not be spent.” Instead, the fund would bank the money until it had accumulated enough to ensure that any program it began would be carried to completion.

That is a laudable goal, Tobias said, “but to send them any more money is not going to help people. There is an emergency here. To put more money in the Global Fund will actually slow down” the fight against AIDS.

He also defended the U.S. position of spending funds only on AIDS drugs that have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “We need to know that the drugs act in the same way” as brand-name drugs, he said. “It would be irresponsible to do anything else.”

He said the FDA had pledged to expedite the review of applications for copies of patented AIDS drugs, promising decisions in two to six weeks. “Why are the companies [who manufacture copies] not racing to FDA with data they must surely have? To do so will give them access to the greatest stream of money for antiretroviral drugs in the history of mankind.

“Eventually, there are going to be hundreds of companies making the drugs ... and we will buy them from the lowest bidder.”