[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36, Number 35 (Monday, September 4, 2000)]
[Pages 1957-1959]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks to Health Care Providers in Abuja, Nigeria

August 27, 2000

    Thank you very much. Mr. President, John, and Tayo, thank you very 
much. I would also like to acknowledge the presence here of the Minister 
of Women's Affairs Ismail; Dr. Agary, the director of the center; Dr. 
Resemane, who came to the White House last year and spoke movingly about 
her battle for women's health. I want to thank the members of the 
American delegation, and especially the Members of Congress, for joining 
us here, and say that I am particularly honored to be welcome by John 
Ibekwe because he is the leader of the Network for People Living With 
AIDS. That is--they have brought a lot of help and hope to Nigeria.
    And let me say I want to thank Tayo again for telling us her story 
and speaking so powerfully for the young people of Nigeria. I'd like to 
hear them both on a regular basis again. I thought they were terrific, 
and I know you're proud of them.
    I would like to acknowledge the contributions in particular of one 
Member of the American Congress who is here, Congresswoman Barbara Lee, 
who along with Representative Jim Leach--[applause]--thank you, Barbara. 
Along with Representative Jim Leach of Iowa, she sponsored the historic 
bipartisan global AIDS act I signed last week. And I thank her and the 
Congress for their support of the worldwide battle against AIDS.
    This program today is a sober reminder that while it is wonderful 
that the people of Nigeria are finally free, to be free does not mean to 
be free of all burdens or all challenges. Indeed, there are challenges 
so serious that if they are left unmet, your democracy will not mean 
very much. The fight against infectious diseases is one such challenge.
    Believe it or not, for all our modern medical advances, infectious 
diseases still account for one out of every four deaths around the 
world, and half the victims--that's why it's good this baby is crying; 
it will remind us of this--half the victims of infectious diseases are 
under 5 years of age. Chiefly because of malaria, mosquitoes will be 
responsible for the death of more than one million people this year.
    And of course, there is no greater challenge than AIDS. No child 
should come into the world with such a deadly disease when it could have 
been prevented. Yet that is happening to millions of African children. 
No community should go without a teacher, yet teachers are dying and 
schools are actually closing because of AIDS. No country should struggle 
to rise out of poverty while fighting a disease that can cut life 
expectancy by as much as 30 years. Yet that already had happened--
already--in some countries on this continent.
    It hasn't happened in Nigeria, thank goodness. But that should not 
be a cause for complacency but instead a call for action. Already there 
are almost 3 million Nigerians living with AIDS. President Obasanjo has 
spoken eloquently today and before today about the challenge and his 
determination to meet it. The only thing I can say to the rest of the 
people of Nigeria is that you must join with the President and with all 
the public health advocates and all the citizens' groups and all the 
people that are present here and the people you represent to help. AIDS 
can rob a country of its future. I know you are not going to let that 
happen to Nigeria.
    I also want to acknowledge that this is not just Nigeria's fight or 
Africa's fight. It is America's fight and the world's fight, too.
    I hope the wealthier countries will do their part, first by 
supporting our initiative to speed the development of vaccines for AIDS, 
malaria, and TB. Just a month ago, at the G-8 summit in Japan, at which 
President Obasanjo appeared, we mobilized billions of dollars to fight 
infectious diseases with the development of vaccines. In addition, we 
have to do more to support the efforts you

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have going now. This year the United States will provide $10 million to 
support your efforts against AIDS, three times more than last year; 
nearly $9 million for polio eradication; $2 million to help you protect 
your children from malaria by distributing bed nets. I must say, that 
bed net that I saw outside this building when I came up, it has to be 
the biggest one in the world--[laughter]--but it certainly made the 
point. And I congratulate you on it.
    I'd also like to thank the president of the Packard Foundation, 
Richard Schlosberg, and the others who are here from the Packard 
Foundation. Where are they? Stand up here. [Applause] There you go. 
Thank you. Over the next 5 years, Packard will make $35 million in 
grants to improve the reproductive health of Nigerian women, and I thank 
them.
    We will also continue to support other education and development 
initiatives including microenterprise loans and greater access for 
technology and education that will help to develop the capacity and the 
willingness and the understanding among children and among women to do 
what is necessary to avoid the most dreaded diseases.
    We know, as your President has just said again, that it will also 
take leadership from Africa. Last April President Obasanjo convened a 
malaria summit, bringing together 44 nations to Nigeria and mobilizing 
the private sector, and next year, as he said, he will host African 
leaders for the summit on AIDS. Later this year, Nigeria will join 17 
African countries for three polio national immunization days. Millions 
of children will be immunized in the largest synchronized health event 
in the history of Africa. Thank you for that.
    I'd also like to thank Rotary International, the World Health 
Organization, UNICEF and the U.N. Foundation, and most of all, the 
volunteers for helping in this cause. And I see we have a lot of people 
from Rotary here today; thank you very much. That is the kind of 
volunteer organized help we need in the fight against AIDS.
    Someday a vaccine will come. We must help it come faster. Yes, there 
must be more done by the wealthy countries to get you medicines, 
especially those that will keep AIDS from being transferred from mothers 
when they're pregnant to their newborn babies. And we will help you do 
that.
    But let's remember something. There is one thing quite different 
from AIDS and most killer diseases. AIDS is 100 percent preventable if 
we are willing to deal with it openly and honestly. In every country, in 
any culture, it is difficult, painful, at the very least embarrassing, 
to talk about the issues involved with AIDS. But is it harder to talk 
about these things than to watch a child die of AIDS who could have 
lived if the rest of us had done our part? Is it harder to talk about 
than to comfort a child whose mother has died? We have to break the 
silence about how this disease spreads and how to prevent it, and we 
need to fight AIDS, not people with AIDS. They are our friends and 
allies.
    I admire profoundly the strength of Nigeria's religious traditions. 
But the teachings of every faith command us to fight for the lives of 
our children. I would like particularly to thank the Muslim Sisters 
Organization for recognizing that and for their many good works in this 
regard.
    Let me say that the good news is, we know this can be done. AIDS 
infection rates have dropped dramatically in our country, but they also 
have dropped dramatically in some places in Africa. If Uganda and 
Senegal can stem the rising tide of infection, so can Nigeria and every 
other African country.
    I am amazed at the courage of the people of Nigeria in struggling 
against the oppression that you endured for too long until you got your 
democracy. I urge you now to show that same kind of courage to beat the 
tyranny of this disease so you can keep your democracy alive for all the 
children of Nigeria and their future.
    You can do this. We will help you. We know we have to do more, but 
so do you. We must not let all the gains that have happened in Nigeria 
and throughout Africa be destroyed by a disease we can prevent if only 
we can get over our reluctance to deal with the uncomfortable aspects of 
it. These children's lives are at stake, and they are worth a little 
discomfort by those of us who have already lived most of our lives.
    Thank you, and God bless you.

[[Page 1959]]

 Note:  The President spoke at 4:25 p.m. at the National Center for 
Women Development. In his remarks, he referred to President Olusegun 
Obasanjo and Minister of Women Affairs and Youth Development Hajia Aisha 
Ismail of Nigeria; Timiebi Koripano-Agary, director general, and Tayo 
Akimuwagun, peer educator, National Center for Women Development; and 
Richard T. Schlosberg III, president, David and Lucile Packard 
Foundation.