Clinton to the rescue again!

Bill Clinton has done deal with two generic drug companies which will ensure that developing countries will be able to access second line anti-retroviral AIDS drugs at reduced prices.

The agreement between the Clinton Foundation and Indian companies Cipla Ltd. and Matrix Laboratories Ltd. will mean 27 poorer countries will be able to buy second line drugs, which are vital when a previous drug regimen fails, for a fraction of the cost.

The former U.S. President says seven million people in the developing world are in need of treatment for HIV/AIDS and his foundation is trying to meet that need with the best medicine available today.

The agreement will benefit 66 countries in total, in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean with middle income countries also being able to buy a once-per-day AIDS pill which will be manufactured and sold for less than 1 dollar a day.

Experts believe that by the year 2010, nearly half a million people in developing countries will need the drugs which currently cost far more money than the majority of developing countries can afford.

As Clinton says, companies will not live or die because of high price premiums for AIDS drugs in middle-income countries, but patients may.

Clinton says while he upholds the belief in intellectual property and understands that manufacturers need to earn profits to keep the discovery and supply of AIDS drugs sustainable, that creed should not prevent essential life-saving medicines reaching those who need them in low and middle-income countries.

The plan is for the AIDS drugs tenofovir, lamivudine and efavirenz to be combined to make up the once-per-day AIDS pill which will cost $339 per patient per year, a 45 percent reduction from the current rate available to low income countries.

The AIDS virus infects nearly 39 million people globally, and has killed 25 million people since it appeared 25 years ago.

Almost all those infected with the virus live in the developing world.

The Foundation will provide funds for the second line AIDS drugs to a total of 27 developing countries through to the end of 2008.