Wall Street Journal - December 5, 2000
Alix M. Freedman and Steve Stecklow

That was no oversight. In an interview, Unicef executive director Carol Bellamy says the decision not to issue a press release reflected her concern that the companies hadn't yet lowered prices. "Let's at least see something before everyone is out there jumping up and down," she said.

For some top Unicef officials, however, a more fundamental issue was this: Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., one of the drug companies involved in the deal, also sells Enfamil infant formula. Unicef has a longstanding prohibition against dealing with companies that it believes endanger children, and some agency insiders were outraged that the agency would even consider joining a pact with a formula maker.

On May 12, the date of Mr. Annan's announcement, two Unicef officials in Kenya, Urban Jonsson and Joanne Csete, wrote to Ms. Bellamy, registering "concern" about the drug alliance. Soon after, Ms. Csete, a seven-year Unicef veteran who was about to be named Unicef's AIDS coordinator, quit. In her resignation letter to Ms. Bellamy, Ms. Csete said the formula industry's "unethical marketing practices continue to harm poor women and children very directly, in many cases taking advantage of the vulnerability of HIV-positive women."

Ms. Csete declines to elaborate. Mr. Jonsson, Unicef's regional director for eastern and southern Africa, says that, after talking to Ms. Bellamy, he no longer believes that Unicef has softened its stance toward the industry. Ms. Bellamy downplays the agency's internal dissension, describing it as a "fluff-up." A spokesman for Bristol-Myers, whose AIDS medicines Zerit and Videx were part of the drug price-reduction pact, declined to comment.

Unicef also balked recently when Abbott Laboratories, maker of the biggest U.S. formula brand, Similac, sought the agency's participation in a proposed multimillion-dollar program to assist African children orphaned by AIDS. Meeting with Unicef officials in May, Abbott said the program would provide funding; products, such as AIDS-testing kits; and volunteers in such areas as education and health care. Rick Moser, an Abbott spokesman, says the company didn't specifically include formula in its plans, but "if someone were to come to us, saying 'we really need infant formula,' we would try to meet that need" -- assuming the company could do so without running afoul of the industry's voluntary marketing agreement with Unicef and the World Health Organization that restricts donations.

Still, David Alnwick, chief of Unicef's health section, wrote in an internal e-mail on June 23 that he had told Abbott that "Unicef had a continuing concern" about formula companies. Ms. Bellamy says Unicef considered it "inappropriate" to accept money from a formula company for an AIDS program. In the end, Abbott went ahead without Unicef's participation.
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