Big Pharma Is the Only Reason Anyone Still Dies From HIV

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The year is 1998. While antiviral drugs to treat HIV had been approved a decade earlier, only five out of 33 million people who carried the virus were receiving the life-saving treatment. Nowhere was the situation worse than in South Africa. The country had the highest global prevalence of the disease with nearly one in five people infected and 200,000 children orphaned.

Treatment options were limited. That year, the Minister of Health released a report outlining the deficiencies in the country’s health care system. The principal finding was that most South Africans could not afford antivirals. The average monthly income at the time hovered around $220 a month , which was nowhere near the $1,000 per month the pharma companies were charging for their wares. Faced with a virus that was decimating his population, Nelson Mandela made a choice that landed him in court for the first time since his arrest several decades earlier for resisting apartheid.

His government broke the patent regime for the antivirals that was chiefly responsible for killing his people—allowing parallel imports in which generics companies manufacture the drug without the patent-holding pharma company’s consent. He was instantly sued by 40 pharmaceutical companies. Bill Clinton’s administration cowered to pressure from the pharma lobby and placed South Africa on a watchlist , subjecting the nation to possible trade sanctions. It ended up being an enormous PR disaster for the obstreperous pharmaceutical firms. After three years of mounting pressure from AIDS activists, the pharma companies finally dropped their case.

While this story has a happy ending, Mandela’s battle against Big Pharma was only a small part of an ongoing war to provide equitable access to HIV medication. In the decades since his court case, taxpayer-funded research has contributed enormously to the development of new HIV treatments. New drugs can now allow people living with HIV to enjoy normal life spans, and completely reduce the risk of new transmissions. Used widely, medications should allow the complete eradication of HIV from the planet. The only obstacle the world is now facing is the same one Mandela stared down: corporate greed which prioritizes profits over human life.

In 2012, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Truvada for the use of Pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, which reduces the risk of HIV transmission. Recent research revealed that U.S. taxpayers … Read More