REPORTING ON THE FIGHT AGAINST AIDS IN POOR NATIONS

Norman Solomon

In Africa, 17 million people have already died of AIDS. In  developing countries around the world, twice that many are now HIV  positive. Such statistics are largely unfathomable. And news accounts  rarely explore basic options for halting the deadly momentum.

But during the past several weeks, some major U.S. media outlets  have taken bold and valuable steps in coverage of the global fight against  AIDS. Mainstream journalists are making headway in reporting on a crucial  issue: How can life-saving drugs get to poor people who need them?

This week, Time magazine features a 20-page cover story that  combines starkly moving photos with text about AIDS and its victims in  Africa. "We have no medicines for AIDS," says a South African doctor. "So  many hospitals tell them, 'You've got AIDS. We can't help you. Go home and  die.'"

While it's an important breakthrough for American journalism, the  Time spread has left ample room for improvement in follow-up efforts. The  critical acuity is sharpest -- and harshest -- when focusing on cultural  and political shortcomings that have contributed to the AIDS disaster in  Africa. But the Manhattan-based magazine is not as tough or explicit when  it assesses culpability closer to home in a one-page closing piece --  "Paying for AIDS Cocktails: Who should pick up the tab for the Third World?"

Noting that "wealthy countries use multidrug-cocktail therapies  that transform AIDS from certain killer to chronic illness," the article  reported: "Despite years of evidence of AIDS' genocidal toll on poor  countries, no one has brought these drugs within reach of ordinary  Africans. In fact, the people who make the drugs -- American- and  European-owned multinational pharmaceutical corporations -- and their home  governments, notably Washington, have worked hard to keep prices up by  limiting exports to the Third World and vigorously enforcing patent rights."

Interestingly, Time failed to name any of those drug companies.  But reporter Johanna McGeary and the magazine deserve credit for raising  pivotal concerns in a high-profile way. "During the tug of war so far," she  explained, "the pharmaceuticals and Western governments have prevailed. But  increasingly, poor countries and AIDS advocates are finding ways to shift  the balance." India and Brazil have manufactured generic copies of AIDS  drugs, "selling them at deeply discounted prices."

Time's reportage comes on the heels of an extensive path-breaking  article in the Sunday magazine of the New York Times, on Jan. 28, by Tina  Rosenberg. "Countries that have tried to manufacture generic medicine have  fallen under debilitating pressure from pharmaceutical companies and from  Washington," she wrote. Among the firms cited in the lengthy article were  Glaxo Wellcome, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck and Pfizer.

Rosenberg took an in-depth look at Brazil's successful  innovations. "Since 1997," she reported, "virtually every AIDS patient in  Brazil for whom it is medically indicated gets, free, the same triple  cocktails that keep rich Americans healthy. (In Western Europe, no one who  needs AIDS treatment is denied it because of cost. This is true in some  American states, but not all.) Brazil has shredded all the excuses about  why poor countries cannot treat AIDS."

The Times article pointed out: "On the shaky foundation of its  public health service, Brazil built a well-run network of AIDS clinics....  Brazilian AIDS patients have proved just as able to take their medicine on  time as patients in the United States." And Brazil's program "has halved  the death rate from AIDS, prevented hundreds of thousands of new  hospitalizations, cut the transmission rate, helped to stabilize the  epidemic and improved the overall state of public health in Brazil."

Hopefully, we'll see a continuation of the current trend toward  clear-eyed investigative reporting about the global reach of the immensely  profitable drug industry. Each prominent example of such journalism helps  to lay the groundwork for others. In late December, the front page of the  Washington Post showcased a series of fine articles, "Death Watch: AIDS,  Drugs and Africa," which included close scrutiny of how drug companies have  raked in huge profits while blocking attempts to provide desperately needed  medication to AIDS sufferers.

A parallel challenge for journalists is to present broader  contexts. For instance: When Time's cover story mentioned, as a significant  cause of prostitution, that "plenty of women in bush villages need extra  cash, often to pay school fees," the magazine did not explain why millions  of African people have been required to pay tuition for education. A key  fact is that for many years, beginning in the late 1980s, powerful lending  institutions like the World Bank insisted that African countries require  user fees for schools and health clinics -- all part of the push to impose  a "free market" for the benefit of Western lenders and investors.

If a new era of reporting on the global AIDS crisis is here,  journalists will be probing for deeper questions and answers.

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Norman Solomon is a syndicated columnist. His latest book is "The Habits of  Highly Deceptive Media."