Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Associated Press - Saturday March 10, 2001
The deal with Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck & Co., and GlaxoSmithKline will reduce the cost of treating HIV patients from about $425 to between $90 and $100 per month, said Assana Sangare, the minister responsible for combatting AIDS.
Sangare said the West African country was among the first to benefit from a pledge made by leading pharmaceutical companies to cut drug prices in developing countries.
Similar discussions were underway with other companies, she said on state-run television. Details of the deals were not released.
Merck spokesman Greg Reaves confirmed Saturday that the New Jersey-based company had agreed to cut the cost of two drugs - Crixivan and Stocrin - which reduce HIV infection in the body and can be used alone or in standard AIDS-medication cocktails.
Crixivan, which sells for $6,016 per patient per year in the United States, will be sold in Ivory Coast and other developing countries for $600 a year. Stocrin, whose U.S. equivalent Sustiva costs $4,730 per patient per year, will be sold for $500 a year.
Similar deals have already been reached with Senegal, Uganda and Rwanda, Reaves said by telephone from Pennsylvania.
Officials from Bristol-Myers Squibb of New York and the British-based GlaxoSmithKline could not immediately be reached for comment.
Drug companies have come under sharp criticism from various governments and relief groups, which accuse them of keeping patented lifesaving medicines beyond the reach of the world's poor.
Nearly 70 percent of the world's HIV-positive population live in sub-Saharan Africa.
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