Mali Signs Cheap AIDS Drug Deal with Western Firms

London- Britain's GlaxoSmithKline Plc said Monday that Mali had become the sixth African country to strike a deal with Western pharmaceutical companies to ensure access to cheap AIDS drugs.

The West African country will receive heavily discounted anti-HIV medicines under the United Nations-sponsored initiative, which is supported by five major drug firms.

The industry is under intense pressure to improve access to life-saving anti-retroviral treatments in sub-Saharan Africa, where the AIDS pandemic has hit hardest.

Senegal, Uganda, Rwanda, Ivory Coast and Cameroon have already signed up under the initiative, backed by the UN's AIDS organisation UNAIDS.
The other firms involved in the initiative are US firms Merck & Co and Bristol-Myers Squibb, Swiss group Roche and the German group Boehringer Ingelheim. GSK said it would supply its Combivir combination therapy at $2 a day under the scheme, a discount of 90%.

The AIDS epidemic has taken its strongest hold in poor sub-Saharan African countries, where 25.3 million people are now infected.
The drug industry is embroiled in a legal fight with South Africa over AIDS drugs in a case that reopens this month.