AIDS activists change their act

On the eve of a United Nations conference, the once-militant ACT-UP revises its tactics and focus.

By Daryl Lindsey

Jun 25, 2001 | Talk to the founding members of ACT-UP, the ones who survived the first wave of AIDS deaths in the 1980s and lived long enough to be able to undergo cocktail therapy treatments, and they like to tell you about guilt.

"I feel a great degree of survivor guilt that I am able to live for 20 years with HIV when my brothers and sisters around the world are dying because they don't have my privilege of wealth and access to these drugs," said Eric Sawyer, the 47-year-old co-founder of ACT-UP New York. It compels me to spend every hour I can fighting for their right to access essential medicines."

The fight for access to life-prolonging drugs has led to a remarkable transformation in the public tactics of ACT-UP. Twelve years ago, ACT-UP made global headlines with over-the-top and occasionally violent protests against the government and religious leaders for their slow and sometimes homophobic response to the AIDS epidemic. In the 1990s, many of the organization's early leaders died -- literally. Then came promising new treatments and a focus on lowering drug prices -- a less dramatic story. The group slipped into a state of semi-obscurity until the battle in South Africa began, in 1998, over the manufacture of generic drugs and importation of less expensive brand-name drugs from other countries.

Today, ACT-UP -- primarily led by its Philadelphia and New York chapters -- is aligning itself with other organizations, like churches, Third World debt relief groups, labor and other groups combating AIDS in developing nations.

The group debuted its new face to an international audience Saturday at a protest on the eve of the United Nations' General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS, the first-ever meeting of the global organization dedicated to any disease. The session convenes officially Monday at the U.N. headquarters in Manhattan.

Though the U.N.'s decision to hold the unprecedented session is a symbol of how far governments have come in acknowledging the spread of the disease, ACT-UP and other AIDS activists are concerned that the proposals and pledges coming out of the countries and organizations involved in the closed-door negotiations will focus almost entirely on prevention, with no plans for treatment of the 36 million people around the world who are currently HIV positive. U.N. member nations have been negotiating over the language of a resolution on AIDS for several weeks now. It's a debate that has pitted industrialized nations against developing nations -- some of which want to produce inexpensive generic versions of HIV cocktail drugs to treat those who are ill. It has also created a divide between socially liberal countries in places like Northern Europe and socially conservative nations, such as some Islamic ones, in which discussions of homosexuality, sexual activity or drug use are still verboten.

By the end of the session Wednesday, a formal plan will be unveiled for a $7 billion to $10 billion fund devised by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and professors at Harvard University. U.S. officials have stated that they will invest little, if any, money in treatment and will instead focus on prevention programs to help stop the spread of the disease. AIDS activists, however, say that treatment is just as crucial in halting the disease as prevention. They describe letting people die of the disease untreated as the result of a sort of genocidal apathy of world leaders and government.

The protest was endorsed by Sen. Jesse Helms' new best friend, Bono Vox of U2, and rock band Radiohead -- both of whom advertised the event on their Web pages. Bono, a leader in the debt relief movement, visited Washington in early June to meet with U.S. officials and the president of the World Bank. He asked them to forgive the debt of certain developing nations to free up money for HIV/AIDS treatment. And that was the message they brought to New York in the "Stop Global AIDS Rally" Saturday.

Next Page: "We're here, we're wet, it's time to drop the debt"

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