TORONTO, Aug 14, 2006 (AFP) - Bill Clinton turned his political dazzle on the rampaging AIDS virus Monday, coaxing frontline scientists and caregivers over a "rocky road" towards victory against the murderous disease.
The former president teamed up with the world's richest man, Bill Gates, to send star power through the 16th International AIDS conference, grouping 20,000 global delegates in Toronto.
He rolled out a characteristic blend of hardball politics and charismatic campaigning skills to bolster the crusade against AIDS he joined after leaving the White House.
"I think it will be a rocky road until we find a vaccine or cure," Clinton predicted at a forum with Gates.
Gates, who fired up the conference with a keynote opening speech Sunday night with wife Melinda, said he was more convinced than ever that the fight against AIDS could be won.
"There's a lot of energy here, and time is on our side," said Gates, fresh from a new 500 million dollar donation to the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.
"Scientists will give us the new tools. Overall this is a story that will have a happy ending because of the energy of the people of this event."
Clinton, once dubbed the "Comeback Kid" for his political resilience, smarted as he was accused in one question from the audience of falling short in combating the disease during his two White House terms between 1993 and 2001.
"That ain't so ... we turned it around, spent a massive amount of money. We did the groundwork on creating the Global Fund," he said.
"We contributed 25 percent of all the funds contributed to international AIDS work when I was president."
"How can you say I didn't do enough when I tripled overseas investment in aid to HIV and AIDS? I think I did do a good job given what was possible...
"I did make a lot of mistakes when I was president, but that wasn't one of them," Clinton said, sparking loud laughter and applause.
The Democratic Party icon also hit out at caricatures of AIDS sufferers -- saying that even people in remote, poverty wracked villages in Africa or Brazil were smart enough to follow antiretroviral drugs regimes to the letter.
"So one more time we have driven a nail in the coffin of those that want to patronize the poor. They will live if you give them the tools to live. They'll do just fine," he said.
And he paid tongue-in-cheek tribute to the Microsoft visionary, while cajoling the scientists, caregivers and grass-roots workers who battle AIDS, to ignore fears that their fight is hopeless.
"Bill Gates made a fair amount of money ... by being able to imagine the future and helping to create a big part of it," Clinton said.
"Do you really believe that he and his wife would be giving all their money away and that naive Warren Buffett would give all his money to them to give away if they didn't believe not only that people's lives were worth saving, but that they could be saved?"
Clinton has been credited for his role in negotiating major price discounts on special antiretorviral drugs with huge pharmaceutical companies to help HIV countries in the developing world.
His foundation says it has helped bring AIDS care and treatment to over 400,000 people around the world, and the former president has clocked up tens of thousands of miles on AIDS advocacy visits.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation last week pledged another half a billion dollars to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.
The money will be paid in annual amounts of 100 million dollars, with 2006 as the starting year, bringing Gates's donations to the fund to 650 million dollars.
At the end of last year, 38.6 million people were living with HIV, UNAIDS estimates. Around 4.1 million people became infected in 2005.
AIDS has killed more than 25 million people since it first emerged as a disease in 1981. In 2005 alone, it killed 2.8 million people.
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