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Compiled By GayToday
Members of ACT UP Philadelphia invade the building of the lobbying association for the pharmaceutical industry Washington, D.C.--Twenty-one AIDS activists demanding access to AIDS drugs in Africa were arrested last week after blocking the doors to the building housing the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association (PhRMA), a lobby group for the brand-name drug industry. The protest followed a rally and march of 1,000 people from all over the East Coast supporting passage of the H.O.P.E. for Africa Act, sponsored by Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-Ill.). Among other provisions, the bill would stop Administration interference with African countries' manufacture of cheap generic versions of essential medicines and ease Africa's crushing debt burden that drains funds from health care. The events were sponsored by a diverse coalition including such large national organizations as the Sierra Club, Rainforest Action Network, Ralph Nader's Public Citizen, UNITE (the textile workers' union), and the Health GAP (Global Access Project) Coalition, a broad network of health and AIDS groups initiated by ACT UP chapters in New York and Philadelphia.
Besides supporting passage of Jackson's H.O.P.E. (Human Rights, Opportunities, Partnership and Empowerment) for Africa Act (H.R. 772)-which currently has 60 co-sponsors-the coalition also urged defeat of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (H.R. 434), an administration bill sponsored by Reps. Charles Rangel (D-NY) and Phillip Crane (R-IL), and heavily backed by oil, automobile and pharmaceutical companies, among others. The Rangel/Crane bill, which passed the House last year but died in the Senate, would force African countries to impose draconian social spending cuts and sell off national assets to Western corporations in order to obtain minor trade concessions. "We oppose trade policy that helps rich companies get richer and leaves poor nations to bury theirdead," said ACT UP/ Philadelphia member Joyce Hamilton. "The H.O.P.E. for Africa Act would bring health and life to Africa, while the Rangel/Crane bill would accelerate the dying," continued Hamilton, an African-American woman living with AIDS. At the rally in a local park addressed by Jackson and various coalition leaders, speakers decried the environmental devastation and large U.S. job losses that would result from the Crane/Rangel bill, as well as the impact of the legislation on the African AIDS epidemic. Then demonstrators marched to the offices of the Corporate Council on Africa, the lobby group backing that bill. From there the march continued to PhRMA's offices. For more than an hour, demonstrators shut down the building. Activists pounded on the doors as they attempted to deliver a coffin draped with a banner reading "PhRMA brings death to Africa." Finally, police arrested the 21 protesters who refused to leave. "The majority of AIDS deaths in the world-12 million of 14 million-have occurred in sub-Saharan Africa, resulting in social and economic devastation," said Sawyer of ACT UP/New York.
Several Representatives have signed on as co-sponsors of both Africa trade bills. Activists insist that lawmakers must choose: "It's better to call the Rangel/Crane bill what it is: the 'AIDS Growth and Opportunistic Infection Act,'" said Hamilton of ACT UP/Philadelphia. "The H.O.P.E. Act and H.R. 434 are as different as night and day. Representatives can't straddle the fence on an issue as crucial as this." After the demonstration, hundreds of activists emphasized that point during afternoon lobbying visits to their legislators. Meanwhile, the arrestees were released after three hours, incurring fines of $50 each. |
