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Africa AIDS Battle
Aired July 10, 2003 - 15:13 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush chose Botswana for today's stop on his five-nation trip through Africa, in part because Botswana is being ravaged by AIDS. The U.N. says Botswana has the world's highest population of AIDS patients. An estimated 30 percent of all people between the ages of 15 and 49 are infected.
With me now for more about the president's trip and U.S. efforts to battle AIDS in Africa are David Gartner of the Global AIDS Alliance and Michael Schwartz of Concerned Women For America.
OK, I listened to the talk going back and forth. This is a great package. This is the most any president has offered. And then you have people saying, it's not enough. Which is it?
DAVID GARTNER, GLOBAL AIDS ALLIANCE: Well, when the president went to the city and he said, seldom has history offered a greater opportunity to do so much for so many and he pledged a big amount of money, the problem is that only half of the pledge in the first year, the $3 billion that Congress has authorized in the first year, is actually in the president's budget.
If we did do the full $3 billion, that would be an important down payment on what's needed. And what's needed, according to U.N. aides, is $10.5 billion in this year alone. So it would be a start on what's needed, but the president's budget only gets us halfway toward even his pledge.
CROWLEY: So -- and yet that's a sizable amount of money, it sounds like to me.
MICHAEL SCHWARTZ, CONCERNED WOMEN FOR AMERICA: It's enormous amount of money. It's $15 billion, is more than all the rest of our foreign aide budget, for example. And I'm very proud that the president has decided to do this. I think it's very much to the credit of the American people that we decided to come to the aid of a continent that's dying.
The president said that what made this possible is that the cost of drugs has come down. If the cost of providing drugs for somebody who's HIV-positive were still $10,000 a year, it would not be possible for the American people, for the American economy to deliver anything to Africa, because we'd have to do triage, we would have to provide drugs for some and not for others. But the drugs have come down.
The president committed $15 billion. Congress passed that. Now, you get a billion and a half this year. Well, it takes time to get things started. The whole $15 billion will go to Africa in five years.
CROWLEY: We are talking about a five-year plan, right? So what's wrong with...
GARTNER: Here's why we can't wait.
CROWLEY: OK.
GARTNER: Already, 25 million have died -- that's one in every ten Americans -- have died from AIDS. Right now, there are 42 million people around the world without access to the drugs that Mike was talking about. They face a death sentence, because they can't get access to drugs that cost just $1 a day.
There is great mechanism to help them now called the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, T.B. and Malaria. The problem is that president's budget this year actually cuts the funding almost in half for the Global Fund. The Global Fund is chaired by Tommy Thompson and is getting that treatment to people. So we need to fully fund the president's pledge and then do even more to help
(CROSSTALK)
SCHWARTZ: That's what this is about. This is about who gets to deliver it. The Global Fund, frankly, has not done a very good job. And they pay their staff in Geneva, Switzerland, far too much money. We had to add an amendment so that nobody there -- every dollar that they get paid over what a federal employee can get would be knocked off their appropriation.
The Global Fund simply has not been -- proven itself effective. Meanwhile, we're talking about getting money directly into Africa.
GARTNER: Michael, I think Tommy Thompson would disagree.
(CROSSTALK)
GARTNER: He's the health and human services secretary. He did a study with the NIH. And the NIH said the Global Fund is giving its money to the right places.
In fact, the Global Fund is giving money to Uganda, the president's next stop, including people from TASO, where he will be visiting on that. So it's sort of -- we're hard-put to say they're not doing the right thing. They just don't have enough money to do it.
SCHWARTZ: I'm glad the Global Fund is putting its money somewhere where people are sick.
But the fact is, the United States is committing $15 billion. Some of it's going through the Global Fund. Some of it will go through other agencies. If this is just an agency money grab, you know that there's a lot more to it than that, David.
GARTNER: I think it's about living up to America's promises. The president promised and Congress passed a bill promising $3 billion this year. He's come through so far with less than half of it. I'm hoping that Congress and the president, while he's in Africa, will step up and fully fund and live up to America's promises to the people of Africa.
CROWLEY: David, does the president get any credit from you at all for putting this issue forward?
GARTNER: Of course. Of course. He's absolutely right. This is the worst health catastrophe ever. The question is whether he'll put the money behind the words. And I'm hoping he will, because, as he said, the test is lives saved. And so far, no lives have been saved by his emergency plan announced six months ago.
In fact, 1.2 million people have died in that time. So I'm using his test of lives saved and saying, we need to do all we can right away.
CROWLEY: David, I've got to stop you there, Global AIDS Alliance. Thank you so much for joining us.
GARTNER: Thank you for having me, yes.
CROWLEY: Michael Schwartz, Concerned Women For America, we'll talk about that later.
(LAUGHTER)
SCHWARTZ: All right.
CROWLEY: Thanks very much. We appreciate it.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired July 10, 2003 - 15:13 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush chose Botswana for today's stop on his five-nation trip through Africa, in part because Botswana is being ravaged by AIDS. The U.N. says Botswana has the world's highest population of AIDS patients. An estimated 30 percent of all people between the ages of 15 and 49 are infected.
With me now for more about the president's trip and U.S. efforts to battle AIDS in Africa are David Gartner of the Global AIDS Alliance and Michael Schwartz of Concerned Women For America.
OK, I listened to the talk going back and forth. This is a great package. This is the most any president has offered. And then you have people saying, it's not enough. Which is it?
DAVID GARTNER, GLOBAL AIDS ALLIANCE: Well, when the president went to the city and he said, seldom has history offered a greater opportunity to do so much for so many and he pledged a big amount of money, the problem is that only half of the pledge in the first year, the $3 billion that Congress has authorized in the first year, is actually in the president's budget.
If we did do the full $3 billion, that would be an important down payment on what's needed. And what's needed, according to U.N. aides, is $10.5 billion in this year alone. So it would be a start on what's needed, but the president's budget only gets us halfway toward even his pledge.
CROWLEY: So -- and yet that's a sizable amount of money, it sounds like to me.
MICHAEL SCHWARTZ, CONCERNED WOMEN FOR AMERICA: It's enormous amount of money. It's $15 billion, is more than all the rest of our foreign aide budget, for example. And I'm very proud that the president has decided to do this. I think it's very much to the credit of the American people that we decided to come to the aid of a continent that's dying.
The president said that what made this possible is that the cost of drugs has come down. If the cost of providing drugs for somebody who's HIV-positive were still $10,000 a year, it would not be possible for the American people, for the American economy to deliver anything to Africa, because we'd have to do triage, we would have to provide drugs for some and not for others. But the drugs have come down.
The president committed $15 billion. Congress passed that. Now, you get a billion and a half this year. Well, it takes time to get things started. The whole $15 billion will go to Africa in five years.
CROWLEY: We are talking about a five-year plan, right? So what's wrong with...
GARTNER: Here's why we can't wait.
CROWLEY: OK.
GARTNER: Already, 25 million have died -- that's one in every ten Americans -- have died from AIDS. Right now, there are 42 million people around the world without access to the drugs that Mike was talking about. They face a death sentence, because they can't get access to drugs that cost just $1 a day.
There is great mechanism to help them now called the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, T.B. and Malaria. The problem is that president's budget this year actually cuts the funding almost in half for the Global Fund. The Global Fund is chaired by Tommy Thompson and is getting that treatment to people. So we need to fully fund the president's pledge and then do even more to help
(CROSSTALK)
SCHWARTZ: That's what this is about. This is about who gets to deliver it. The Global Fund, frankly, has not done a very good job. And they pay their staff in Geneva, Switzerland, far too much money. We had to add an amendment so that nobody there -- every dollar that they get paid over what a federal employee can get would be knocked off their appropriation.
The Global Fund simply has not been -- proven itself effective. Meanwhile, we're talking about getting money directly into Africa.
GARTNER: Michael, I think Tommy Thompson would disagree.
(CROSSTALK)
GARTNER: He's the health and human services secretary. He did a study with the NIH. And the NIH said the Global Fund is giving its money to the right places.
In fact, the Global Fund is giving money to Uganda, the president's next stop, including people from TASO, where he will be visiting on that. So it's sort of -- we're hard-put to say they're not doing the right thing. They just don't have enough money to do it.
SCHWARTZ: I'm glad the Global Fund is putting its money somewhere where people are sick.
But the fact is, the United States is committing $15 billion. Some of it's going through the Global Fund. Some of it will go through other agencies. If this is just an agency money grab, you know that there's a lot more to it than that, David.
GARTNER: I think it's about living up to America's promises. The president promised and Congress passed a bill promising $3 billion this year. He's come through so far with less than half of it. I'm hoping that Congress and the president, while he's in Africa, will step up and fully fund and live up to America's promises to the people of Africa.
CROWLEY: David, does the president get any credit from you at all for putting this issue forward?
GARTNER: Of course. Of course. He's absolutely right. This is the worst health catastrophe ever. The question is whether he'll put the money behind the words. And I'm hoping he will, because, as he said, the test is lives saved. And so far, no lives have been saved by his emergency plan announced six months ago.
In fact, 1.2 million people have died in that time. So I'm using his test of lives saved and saying, we need to do all we can right away.
CROWLEY: David, I've got to stop you there, Global AIDS Alliance. Thank you so much for joining us.
GARTNER: Thank you for having me, yes.
CROWLEY: Michael Schwartz, Concerned Women For America, we'll talk about that later.
(LAUGHTER)
SCHWARTZ: All right.
CROWLEY: Thanks very much. We appreciate it.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
