Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-04-24-Speech-2-066"
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"en.20070424.5.2-066"2
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".
Mr President, AIDS is still an ongoing tragedy, not only in developing countries, but also in Europe, not only among homosexuals and drug users, but also among heterosexuals and the totally abstinent, and so I should like to extend warm thanks to our rapporteur. Mr Andrejevs, who has put a great deal into this work and has written a fine report.
Our group must pull out all the stops in order to call a halt to the AIDS epidemic, and we need to invest with this in mind. First of all, we must invest in people, in women. We must take prevention seriously. We must take the reality of women, young people, sex workers and drug users seriously, and that reality is what we need to take as a basis. It is essential that good information be provided in schools and hospitals, the sort of information that treats people’s moral choices with respect, and should also include information about all sexually transmittable diseases, since these increase vulnerability for AIDS.
Secondly, we must invest in new products, in microbicides, in products that enable women to protect themselves against AIDS, in medicines and vaccines, and in more environmentally-friendly medicines. Condoms for men and women must be become more widely available.
Thirdly, we need to invest in political innovation. We must overcome the existing obstacles without delay. Medicines and vaccines are often not affordable to groups that need them the most. Reasons for this are the high development costs of medicines and the relatively short recoup time, as a result of which new medicines are prohibatively expensive. We must face these problems and the public responsibility that goes with them. There are ways out of this situation, for example more public-private partnerships to develop AIDS medicines and vaccines, which may bring their cost down to some extent, while we should also make use of all the options open to us in order to invalidate patents in the public interest, something for which the TRIPS agreements set the right tone.
Finally, what is needed if essential medicines are to be available for the fight against AIDS is better negotiation with the pharmaceutical industry, something in which the Commission can play a key role, and I would warmly support the rapporteur’s amendment to this effect."@en1
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