Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2001. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Miami Herlad - Wednesday, September 5, 2001
For years, developing nations complained that prices for HIV drugs put them out of their reach. Then in March, New Jersey-based Merck & Co. announced it would sell two HIV treatments at no profit in the world's poorest and hardest-hit nations -- including eight Caribbean countries.
"The excuse in the past always has been we can't afford these drugs," said Sean Hughes, head of Merck's HIV/AIDS drug initiative in the Caribbean. "In the Caribbean in general, things move slower.
The response is there, but I don't think it's been fast enough." The discounts were for its HIV drugs Stocrin and Crixivan, which suppress the replication of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
Patients in Haiti, Trinidad, the Dominican Republic, Guyana and Suriname would pay around dlrs 1,100 for an annual dosage of both drugs, about 85 percent less than the cost in the United States.
In St. Lucia, Jamaica and St. Kitts, patients would pay a little less than dlrs 2,000 for a dosage of both.
With an estimated 2 percent infection rate among a population of some 25 million, the Caribbean, excluding Cuba, has world's second-highest infection rates after Africa.
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