guerrillaradio
21st January 2003, 23:32
A new UN report is out accusing the West of "mass murder through complancency" in their policies concerning the sale of medicines and drugs to the Third World. Considering how much of an epidemic AIDS has been in the last 20 years (fuck knows how many people have been killed by it, and how many more will die yet), you woulda thought that we could all agree to let cheap drugs flow easily to the Third World. Well, yeah: Europe let it, as did everywhere else, apart from one nation. Yep, the USfuckinA. Apparently the wording in this agreement (drafted in December) was "too broad", as it referred to "AIDS, malaria, TB and other diseases". Apparently, the Third World has no right to demand the right to survive any diseases other than the really really really serious ones that get on telly and upset us. Of course, cos the US refused to sign it didn't go ahead, and there are still no cheap drugs in the Third World. And it's not like the anger at this is reserved to leftists such as myself. Even the EU Trade Comissioner, a bastion of the right everywhere, is getting fed up. He calls the American stalling "stupid". Personally, I don't understand it. I mean, isn't it in America's interest to lower the death rate in the Third World?? Where would all their corporations go for labour if everyone's dying?? Bucketheads...