Last Updated on December 2, 2019, 9:03 AM AST by Anthony Morris
As St Kitts and Nevis and the rest of the international community celebrate December 1, as World AIDS Day, it is recorded in history that the Federation’s Second Prime Minister the Rt Hon Dr Denzil Douglas is credited for initiating the availability of low cost anti-rival drugs to HIV/AIDS around the world.
Former United States President the Honorable William “Bill” Clinton has lauded Dr Douglas and credits him closing session of an annual Clinton Global in New York in 2013 where he received a resounding round of applause when former President Clinton asked Douglas to join him on the stage.
The former President Clinton told the hundreds in the audience which included his wife, former Secretary of State, the Hilary Clinton and daughter, Chelsea Clinton that he also want to thank his great friend, St. Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Dr. Denzil Douglas for being there. He said that now for all of you starting on your commitments, this man caused him a lot of trouble.
Clinton said that during his tenure as the President of the United States, he had put more attention to the Central America and the Caribbean than any other American President had done in decades.
Clinton recalled that in 2002, Nelson Mandela and he was invited to close the International AIDS Conference in Barcelona.
Clinton said that and all they were doing because there was no money then. There was no money for AIDS; there no Global Fund. He said He and Mandela pretended that they were Statesmen and all they were doing was rattling a cup from the people who were still in office, begging for money. Clinton added that he was within process of building his Presidential Library.
“We had around ten employees in the Clinton Foundation. It was nothing compared to today, we have around 1300 people working with us now,” he added.
“So Denzil comes up to me and said what I already grasp which is that the Caribbean had the second quickest growing rates of AIDS within the World. And that he was guilty of coping with this as a result of he was a doctor; and he checked out me and once Mandela and that I had given all of our high flown rhetoric, and he said ‘look Bill, we don’t have a stigma problem, we don’t have a denial problem, we have a money problem and an organization problem.’
Then I aforesaid ‘Denzil, what do you want me to do about it?
’ And he looked at me and said ‘I want you to fix it! ’ And sort of a fool, I said ‘okay.’ It was my CGI moment; I had no idea what we going to do,” Clinton told the audience.
“Okay quick forward, now we are providing the least expensive drugs to people, ARV drugs in 70 countries.
More than five million folks get medication off of our contracts, thanks to the French Airline Tax and a programme called UNITAID, our Foundation is able to provide life saving medication for seventy-fifth of the kids on earth that area unit unbroken alive by AIDS medication, all because of this crazy conversation I had with an old friend that I had simply saw,” said the former US president.
Clinton added: “I had no profane concept all the items that have unfolded within the last eleven years would have happened, but I am profoundly grateful for it and I owe it all to him (Prime Minister politico.”
Clinton asked the audience to give Dr Denzil Douglas a round of applause.
In a brief response, Dr Douglas said: “I want to thank president (Clinton) for really bringing life to several thousand of people in the Caribbean (and) assisting us in creating the PAN Caribbean Partnership in the fight against HIV/AIDS (PANCAP) in bringing relief in terms of the anti-retroviral drugs which were unavailable and unaffordable.”
Anthony Morris covers stories related to politics and regional developments. His in-depth reporting about governance and reforms makes him stand out in regional journalism, with a deep analysis of political trends and their impact on Caribbean communities.
