AEGiS-AP: Hollywood actor Richard Gere wants western nations to do more to prevent AIDS in Asia

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2002. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Hollywood actor Richard Gere wants western nations to do more to prevent AIDS in Asia

Associated Press - Saturday, November 16, 2002

NEW DELHI, India - Hollywood actor Richard Gere wants Western nations to do more to prevent HIV/AIDS in Asia, where many fear the disease is spreading fast.

"I think we in the West can do much more to help and we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars," Gere said in an interview to the BBC world service Friday. It was not clear where he was speaking.

Gere, who has a long association with India and has been campaigning widely against the spread of AIDS in this region, said he didn't want Indians to suffer the way people in the United States and Africa did in the past.

"I've seen how we didn't take it seriously enough and in America we could have stopped it sooner. Having experienced that and lived through that ... I don't want to see them (Indians) have to go through that same thing," Gere said.

"I feel a strong affinity for India. ... India for me is a second home in many ways."

India is now home to about 4 million infected people - more than any other country in the world except South Africa, which has 4.7 million people with the virus.

Its government says its efforts to prevent HIV/AIDS have succeeded in keeping the numbers stable in recent years, but a U.S. government report recently warned that the number of people living with HIV/AIDS in India could rise to 25 million by 2010.

Gere said contributions from the U.S. government and Microsoft chief Bill Gates - together totaling US$220 million - to help India fight the spread of AIDS was important, but countries like India needed more.

"Lack of resources mitigates anyone's seriousness," he said when asked if he found the Indian government to be serious about preventing HIV/AIDS.

Gere said, China was the next place that would explode in terms of AIDS numbers, if its government did not do enough to stop the disease.

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