Calling for an "AIDS free generation" but trading away our lives
Some of the loudest and most passionate demonstrations at the XIX International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2012) condemned the United States and European Union trade agreement negotiations which aim to protect the profits of pharmaceutical companies and let people in low and middle income countries die for their sake. During her address to the conference, Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, with an air of optimism, joined the call for an “AIDS free generation“, highlighting the fact that the tools for its achievement exist. At the same time, her government, through negotiations for the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), is pushing to radically expand pharmaceutical company monopolies and therefore maintain high prices on and limited access to life-saving medicines for HIV and associated co-morbidities. “Today US trade policy is threatening to undermine US AIDS policy,” said Peter Maybarduk of Public Citizen, a prominent US consumer rights group.