International AIDS Society Newsletter, no. 21

IASI
INTERNATIONAL
Edit rialAIDS SOCIETY

Take the 0ffensive!

The content of the present issue of the
Newsletter deals with many of the IAS activities
and the burning topics of today in our field.
AIDS and globalization is dramatically illustrated by the Argentinean case. The WHO-IAS
partnership on global HIV drug resistance surveillance is an important step in the management of increased access to antiretroviral drugs
as is HIV research and training in resource-constrained countries. I would also like to point to
Brigitte Autran's article on the strategies
towards restoration of immunity to HIV,
including intermittent treatment with the
Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy
(HAART) and therapeutic vaccination.
Arranging the series of International AIDS
Conferences is, of course, one of the IAS main
activities. Right now we are focussing on the
XIV Conference in the series in Barcelona, 20
years into the HIV pandemic. Please, read the
Key Messages of the Barcelona Conference on
page 14.
Note also the three IAS Satellites on access to
care, drug resistance and HIV in women and
children (see back of Newsletter cover).
Our Force
When civil society organisations, scientists and
professionals join forces we are very strong and
are able to move mountains. This has, for
instance, happened in the environmental field,
where powerful international companies and
governments have been forced to back out due
to strong factual arguments and overwhelming
public opinion. In our field, the international
drug companies, similarly, withdrew their legal
claims against the South African government
regarding intellectual property rights, even

though they would probably have won the case
legally. The price they would have had to pay for
bad publicity turned out to be too high. As a
result, the price for brand products has now
been decreased by 70-90 per cent in many developing countries. A short time ago nobody would
have believed that such important steps towards
increased access to drugs in developing countries would have been possible. This has been
achieved comparatively fast, taking into consideration that HAART was introduced only six
years ago, that means from Vancouver to
Barcelona. HAART has been a revolution in
itself. The distribution of generics produced in
the South of the world competing with brand
products and efficiently increasing access is
another revolution. True, access to drugs is, and
tragically, will still be too late for millions of people living with HIV, so I am only referring to the
important new trends for the future. Shamefully,
there are also ironic situations, which are totally
unacceptable, e.g. that the generic drugs successfully exported from India are not made accessible
to India's own population. Why? Does the
Government of huge and resourceful India value
the life of its citizens less as compared to how
Brazil value human life.
Need for Activism
We are all hoping that the Barcelona Conference
will signify yet another powerful step towards
putting all the accumulated knowledge and
technology into action. However, we must not
be satisfied with only one big step every other
year. First and foremost, we must all bring the
new knowledge and inspiration gained in
Barcelona with us back home and spread it
widely through professional and community

LARS O KALLINGS, Secretary-General, Editor

activism. In addition, we should work actively
through our organisations. There will be many
activities during the intervening years, before
Bangkok 2004, community as well as scientifically based exercises. For instance, IAS would
like to stress the regional events, in particular
the Regional Conferences, such as the ICASA in
Nairobi on September 21-27, 2003, the ICAAP
in Kobe, Japan in November 2003, not to forget
the Latin American corresponding arrangements. After all, one of the main ideas behind
arranging the International AIDS Conferences
biennially after Yokohama in 1994 instead of
annually as before was to give a more prominent
role to the Regional Conferences.
The global efforts against HIV/AIDS represent a long march, indeed. However, it is not
enough to persevere as we have learnt, victory
comes through attack. Now, we have got public
and political awareness to build on, new, though
yet insufficient financial resources through the
Global Fund and new scientific tools to use.
This might be the turning-point we have ached
for. So, let's go for it!

Contents: IAS-CTP Meetings in Seattle duringthe 9th Conference
Letter from the President....................................................................... 2 on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections.........................................12
Editorial............................................................................................ 3 IAS-CTP Seattle Update Meeting: HIV Research & Training
Strategies TowardsRestorationoflmmunitytoHIV Brigitte Autran, MD. PhD........ 4 in Resource-Constrained Countries....................................................13
The Global HIV Drug Resistance Surveillance Program: a Partnership between WHO Barcelona Key Conference Message...................................................14
and IASDiane Havli MD, Stefano Vella, MD and Scott Hammer, MD..................... 7 Future Events........................................................15
AIDSandGlobalization:TheArgentineanCase Pedro Cahn, MD, PhD and Kurt Frieder..... 10 IAS Satellites in Barcelona...............................................................16