Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1998. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
The Associated Press - Friday, December 18, 1998
Sandra Sobieraj, Associated Press Writer
In turn, Clinton warned that 2000 will be tight budget year for AIDS research but he endorsed the council's proposal for a national media campaign to promote voluntary testing for the HIV virus that causes AIDS.
"It has been 19 months to the day since your announcement of the vaccine goal and a director of the vaccine center at NIH has not yet been appointed," Helen Miramontes, a member of the president's HIV/AIDS advisory council, told Clinton in a meeting in the Cabinet Room.
She said just one preliminary vaccine meeting has been convened at the National Institutes of Health since Clinton, in a 1997 commencement address, invoked the legacy of John F. Kennedy's 1960s race to the moon and set a 10-year target for developing an AIDS vaccine.
"When President Kennedy announced that we were going to put a man on the moon, he appointed a person within the White House to oversee this endeavor," Miramontes said, asking Clinton to add a vaccine coordinator to the staff of the Office of National AIDS Policy.
Clinton responded with a vote of confidence in the office's director, Sandy Thurman, and with a promise that a vaccine director at NIH "is about to be appointed."
The council requested additional AIDS research and treatment funds in his fiscal 2000 budget, particularly for an initiative targeting minority populations.
"This budget year will be more difficult than the last one because we got such big increases in everything last time and because of the global economy kind of slowing down," Clinton responded. "But we'll do the best we can."
Dr. Scott Hitt, the council's chairman, told Clinton that 300,000 Americans do not know they are infected with HIV. "And contrary to your own stated goals, we are not decreasing the numbers of new people infected," Hitt said.
Clinton promised to work on creating a public/private outreach campaign to lessen the stigma of HIV testing. "It offers the promise of sort of getting by the divisive arguments of the past and actually doing something. I like it," he said.
He also said he would consider asking Vice President Al Gore, in his ongoing discussions with the pharmaceutical industry, to press for price cuts on HIV-related drugs.
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