[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 62 (Wednesday, May 15, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4345-S4346]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       TRADE PROMOTION AUTHORITY

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today to express my thanks to 
Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley for accepting the Kennedy-
Feinstein-Feingold amendment to trade promotion authority. Our 
amendment instructs our trade negotiators to respect the Declaration on 
the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health adopted by the World Trade 
Organization at the Fourth Ministerial Conference at Doha, Qatar.
  This amendment is essential for the developing countries of the world 
as they confront public health crisis, such as the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
  The Doha declaration simply recognizes the right of these countries 
to use practices such as ``compulsory licensing'' to gain access to 
affordable pharmaceutical drugs. These practices are fully consistent 
with international law, specifically the TRIPS agreement which is the 
presumptive legal standard for intellectual property rights.
  Without these practices, the vast majority of HIV/AIDS patients in 
the developing world would not be able to afford the more expensive 
drugs from American pharmaceutical companies and, as a result, they 
would suffer and die.
  The statistics compel us to action. HIV/AIDS is now the leading cause 
of death in sub-Saharan Africa. Worldwide, it is the fourth biggest 
killer. At the end of 2001, an estimated 40 million people globally 
were living with HIV/AIDS; there were 5 million new infections and 3 
million deaths as a result of the disease. In the last twenty years, we 
have come a long way, but we are still losing because people are still 
dying.
  Sub-Saharan Africa houses about 10 percent of the world's population 
but more than 70 percent of the worldwide total of infected people, 95 
percent of all HIV/AIDS cases are of those living in developing 
countries.
  An estimated 25.3 million people are living with HIV/AIDS in sub-
Saharan Africa and 19.3 million Africans have died of AIDS, including 
2.3 million last year. This has meant an increase to a cumulative total 
of 12.1 million AIDS orphans, which is expected to increase to 42 
million by the year 2010. An estimated 600,000 African infants become 
infected with HIV each year through mother-to-child transmission, 
either at birth or through breast-feeding.
  These statistics are what they are in spite of the tools we have to 
ease the situation.
  The Kennedy-Feinstein-Feingold amendment is by no means the perfect

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solution and there is a great deal of work yet to be done. But it is an 
important step for the United States to maintain a leadership role in 
the global effort against HIV/AIDS.
  We should not punish countries of the developing world for using 
different tools to provide affordable treatment for their citizens who 
are suffering. We should be a partner and a leader in this effort.
  Again, I thank the managers of this bill for accepting the amendment 
and I look forward to working with them again on this important 
international health issue.

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