Italy to Seek G-7 Support
For New-Vaccine Proposal
By LUCA DI LEO and JENNIFER CLARK
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
December 2, 2005
LONDON – Italy this weekend will try to persuade the world's richest countries to sign up for a plan aimed at promoting the development of new vaccines that could save more than seven million lives a year, predominantly in poor countries.
While grand projects often fail to muster support, supporters say the beauty of Italy's plan is that it is cost-free initially and any eventual outlays depend on solutions being found.
The plan requires that wealthy countries pledge as much as $7.6 billion to pharmaceutical companies, if and when they develop vaccines to cure HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis -- three of the largest scourges in developing countries.
Italy's call for so-called advance market commitments for vaccines will be one of the main topics of discussion as finance ministers from the Group of Seven leading industrial nations meet here Friday and Saturday.
Other topics are expected to include rising world-wide interest rates, global imbalances and exchange rates. A repeat of concerns about the risk high energy costs pose to world economic growth is also likely.
The G-7 group -- which includes the U.S., the U.K., France, Italy, Japan, Germany and Canada, plus unofficial member Russia -- is also expected to stress the need for progress at the World Trade Organization global trade talks that start in Hong Kong next week.
Italy was assigned the vaccine project, part of a wider U.K.-led effort to boost aid transfers to poor nations, after showing enthusiasm for its outline at a meeting of G-7 finance ministers in June.
Italy's report says advance commitments are the best way to stimulate pharmaceutical companies to invest more in vaccine research, according to a draft copy seen by Dow Jones Newswires.
The plan is described as "a market-based, result-focused initiative that is capable of mobilizing private resources before public money is spent and is very cost-effective if compared to other interventions in favor of developing countries."
While finding a way to bring medical cures to poor countries has nearly universal support, governments have been reluctant to jump on the costly bandwagon of making vaccines available to poor nations.
In September, the U.K. was the main contributor to an initiative known as the International Finance Facility for Immunization, in which rich countries pledged $4 billion over 10 years to get existing vaccines to poor countries. But only Italy, France, Spain and Sweden signed up for the initiative. Of the other G-7 members, Japan and Germany haven't been keen to participate, and the U.S. refused, citing problems with spending. |
