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CYRUS BROACHA: Welcome back. The show is Staying-Alive. In case you’ve just tuned in, we’ve got a very, very important segment coming up right now. Money is the issue. Is the money going in the right direction; money for funds, money for research, money for drugs? Do governments give us a problem with that money going in the right people’s pockets, or perhaps the wrong people’s pockets? We’ll find out right now and more, but first before we do that, a very important moment for me. We’ve got a person who goes back a long way, just as I do. He goes back to the States. I go back to India after the show is over. Thank you.

Yes, ladies and gentleman, we have Mr. President, himself, Bill Clinton in our studio right now, so let’s give him a round of applause. (applause) This really raises the ante. You know our fight now against AIDS is serious. We’ve got the big guy on our side. We’ll come back and talk to him, but first let’s find out about this money problem, funds and everything else while watching this.

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UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Three hundred million of the world’s population live on less than one U.S. dollar a day. The UN calculates the poorer countries require $10 billion U.S. dollars a year to reverse the spread of HIV, but so far they’ve received only 10 percent of what is needed. Every year, world leaders spend $800 billion U.S. dollars on military weapons.

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CYRUS BROACHA: All right, ladies and gentlemen, we have him here and won’t waste his time. We’ll go right to it. So Tina, how about it?

TINA: Hi, I’m Tina from South Africa. I would like to address this question to you, Mr. President. How come--how is it possible that 3,000 people were killed during the September 11th attack in the USA and the U.S. government was able to--to find $40 billion in a matter of three days. But still the world can’t have the money, $10 billion in a matter of a year, but the U.S. government still got a chance to have $40 billion in a matter of three days. How is that possible?

BILL CLINTON: Well, I think the short answer to your question is, that people viewed the 3,100 people from 70 nations who were murdered in the United States on September 11th in a different light than they view all the people who die of AIDS. People who die of epidemics throughout history tend to be anonymous except for those who live with them and love them. And the good thing about this meeting, the good thing about this program, the good thing about all the AIDS activism in the world in the last 20 years slowly building up, is that there is an awareness that for the first time in history the whole world has to take responsibility for a global health epidemic. So, I know this is frustrating for you because South Africa has the largest number of AIDS cases on Earth and has been burdened more than any other country, particularly with all the people coming in from Zimbabwe. But we’re actually here and we’re talking about this because you have the whole world committed, at least in theory, to take responsibility for this.

I would just like to make two points. First of all, because a lot of the people watching this are young like you, but they don’t know as much as you do about AIDS. Two-thirds of the cases are in Africa, but the fastest growing rates of AIDS are in the former Soviet Union on Europe’s back door. The second fastest growing in the Caribbean on America’s front door. The third fastest growing rates of AIDS in India, the world’s biggest democracy, and earlier this year China acknowledged they had twice as many cases as they had thought. So, this is a young person’s problem and it’s a global problem.

The second thing I want to say is, my--I hope you will ask more questions about this money, but you just had a panel with someone from Brazil, who has basically been responsible for cutting the death rate in half in three years, cutting the hospitalization by 80 percent in three years because the government produces the drugs, or the companies produce the drugs, the government pays for them and they have a distribution system, and they have a prevention program that goes along with it.

So, what I would like to talk to you about is, like what do we do? We know we need more money, but I would argue that we can get more money if we have a specific thing to spend the money on. America now spends probably $800 million a year, more or less this year, on fighting the AIDS epidemic worldwide, and our fair share would be $2.5 billion, maybe a little more. That’s--so the difference of where we are and where we need to be is less than two months of the war in Afghanistan. We should be able to come up with money like this. What we need to do is to say, this is how we’re going to spend the money. Yesterday, the Caribbean countries announced they had reached an agreement with the drug companies to get low cost drugs. So, what do we need? We need to know how much are they going to pay? What can they afford? What’s the difference? Come to America, their nearest neighbors, where we have people from every Caribbean nation, and ask us for the difference. That’s how we can fill up this gap between where we are and the $10 billion by having very specific plans that you can ask America or Europe or Japan or someone else to fund.

CYRUS BROACHA: All right. We’ll move a little away from drugs for a second. Lydiah, you have to say something you told me earlier in the show, so go for it.

LYDIAH: Right. Thank you very much. My name is Lydiah Boseri and I am from Kenya. Mr. President, you have been praised around the world as the first U.S. President to take AIDS seriously, yet when you got in office, there was a law in place that required HIV positive persons traveling to the United States to declare their status. This, as we know, will increase stigma and discrimination. In your eight years in office, you did not repeal this law. Why?

BILL CLINTON: The most important reason is that the Congress wouldn’t have passed it. A President can’t repeal a law unless the Congress votes for it and there was never enough votes to vote for it. Secondly, what I tried to do--I understand how it looks to you, but what I tried to do was to reach a point where there was no stigma to being HIV positive in America. And we have been blessed by having a lot of people like Magic Johnson come out and say, “I am HIV positive” and by having a lot of other people who work with people who are HIV positive help to reduce the stigma of the disease. And so, maybe we should have done that. We couldn’t do that, but the most important thing is, people shouldn’t be ashamed to acknowledge they’re HIV positive because they ought to be able to get the medicine they need. They ought to be able to get the treatment they need if they’re in a medical emergency. And there should--every country should have laws absolutely banning any discrimination in access to education, health care, or jobs for anybody who is HIV positive. It shouldn’t be a badge of shame. I mean there are 40 million people walking around with this disease now. There are going to be 100 million in a few years if we don’t turn it around. That’s not necessary, but there will be more anyway. So, what I would prefer to do is to make it so that no one fears ever to say, “I’m HIV positive” and there’s no discrimination against it.

CYRUS BROACHA: Okay, quick comments anybody? Very quickly, Ben? Quickly.

BEN: Mr. President, it’s our generation that’s dying from this disease. Half of all new infections are among young people and we’re angry that our governments are taking responsibility for what they can do to stop AIDS at home, and in rich countries, what they can do to stop AIDS around the world. What can young people do to mobilize their governments to take action?

BILL CLINTON: First of all, I think it’s important that every government have a plan and have an assessment. That is, we should all pay in accordance with our wealth and our ability to pay. So, America has let’s say 22 percent of the world’s Gross Domestic Product, but a lot of poor countries can’t afford to pay anything. So, let’s say our fair share is 25 percent. Say, what’s Europe’s percentage of the Gross Domestic Product? That’s their fair share. What’s Japan’s? So, we should--every young person should know, every person watching this. And if you live in a country, even a poor country that has a big problem, they’re spending money--your government’s spending money on something. I’m a--I consider myself--let’s talk about Cyrus’s--I consider myself a friend of India.

I tried to re-establish American relations with India for the first time in 40 years. But India has a huge AIDS problem and could soon have far more cases than South Africa just because of the way people live in the cities in India. When I spoke to the Indian Parliament, in that year they approved a 22 percent increase in defense spending. Why are they doing that? Because of this problem with Pakistan. Instead, you know, there needs to be a global effort to help diffuse those tensions, so they can pay something. So, it’s not--so the first thing you need to know is, wherever you’re from, what’s your government’s fair share and are they paying it?

The second thing is, is there a plan? What is the plan? You know, you can criticize the drug companies. Some are much better than others, but the South African drug case, which was decided a year and a half ago said, “All the drug companies have to agree to sell drugs at discounts to poor countries.” Okay? The Caribbean plan was announced yesterday. Most countries still haven’t cut their deals with the drug companies. So, the second thing is, you need to make sure there is a plan.

And then once you know what the price is, you figure out what the government can afford to pay there and what the rest of us have to kick in, and then who’s going to give the drugs out and teach people how to use them? In other words, there are all of these pieces out there. The money will come today. The world has awakened to this if there is a plan. Every country needs to have an agreement with the drug companies and then there needs to be a strategy to implement it. That’s what my advice is. So, all of the people watching this, they need to know what their country is supposed to pay and badger them to pay it, and then badger them to have a plan, and then badger them to implement it.

CYRUS BROACHA: All right.

BILL CLINTON: It’s not very complicated.

CYRUS BROACHA: It’s not every day we get to interrupt a President, but we’re running out of time, folks. I know everybody wants to ask questions. Mr. President, stigma and discrimination always a big problem when we talk about AIDS and HIV. Perhaps you could show us for a second that there’s no problem in coming in contact or touching or getting close to someone who is infected?

BILL CLINTON: So, who’s HIV positive, who is not ashamed to say it? (Mr. Clinton put his arms around two HIV positive young people.) So, I feel just as healthy as I did two seconds ago.

CYRUS BROACHA: There you go.

BILL CLINTON: All right?

(applause)

CYRUS BROACHA: That’s a message for everybody out there. You heard it from the big guy, himself, and if we can do it, we can all do it. He set the example. There is just nothing wrong. We’re all the same and we’re here to fight the battle. Maybe we’re spending too much on defense, maybe we need to look at our health plans, but that’s for another day.

In the meantime, I just want to say bye to everybody. Thanks for watching the show. It’s called Staying-Alive. We’ll come back and talk some more when we do have the time. Once again, thank you so much. Thank you to the panel, and I think the President is going to be with us, so if you can get on your computer, you can log on right now to our wonderful Website, which will appear somewhere next to our bodies, which are as healthy as yours.

All right? We’ll see you. Have a nice day, and remember, AIDS is our problem and we’ve got to fight it together. Thank you. Bye-bye.