GlaxoSmithKline Announces New Plan For African Aid
On July 14, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) announced its plans to invest £60 million ($97 million) in AIDS treatment in Africa over the next ten years. The company’s plans focus primarily on the care and treatment of children with HIV and AIDS as well as improved access to antiretroviral drugs.
Andrew Witty, the Chief Executive Officer of GSK, outlined several programs aimed to help those living with HIV and AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa. According to the World Health Organization, more than three-quarters of all AIDS related deaths occurred in this region in 2007. GSK’s newly developed initiative builds on commitments revealed in February to address diseases that disproportionately affect poor countries.
Over two million children, most of whom are in Sub-Saharan Africa, live with HIV/AIDS. Many of these were infected with HIV through mother-to-child transmission, during pregnancy, labor, delivery, or breastfeeding. Mother-to-child transmission is almost entirely preventable, but only if services are available.
In poor countries, like those in Sub-Saharan Africa, health care coverage levels are extremely low so many individuals with HIV/AIDS do not receive preventative services. GSK plans to utilize $80 million to develop a ‘Positive Action Children Fund’ to support current non-governmental organizations in confronting this issue. The fund will also help to support vulnerable children and orphans whose parents have died from AIDS-related illnesses.
Access to affordable treatment also remains one of the main obstacles for HIV-positive people living in Sub-Saharan African countries. To improve access to antiretroviral drugs, GSK contracted a new licensing agreement with South African generic pharmaceutical company Aspen Pharmacare. This contract allows Aspen to manufacture a cheaper generic version of the nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor Ziagen (abacavir).
The British pharmaceutical company will also contribute $17 million to public-private partnership work. Organizations in the partnership include the African Medical and Research Foundation, the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, and the Kenyan Ministry of Health. The program will support work specifically focusing on research and development of new antiretroviral drugs for children.
As part of GSK’s initiative to fight the AIDS pandemic in the world’s poorest countries, GSK and Pfizer pharmaceutical companies publicized an agreement in April to create an HIV company focused on disease prevention, tackling stigma and discrimination, and improving treatment and access.
Mr Witty’s words at the Positive Action Zingatia Maisha HIV program in Kenya summed up the focus of this GSK initiative: “Our objective for Africa is clear – to make existing medicines as widely available as possible while at the same time ensuring sustained investment into R&D for a new generation of medicines.”
For more information, see the GSK press release.
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