africa: AIDS Activists Push For More Access to Drugs to Reduce Deaths

"We want drugs! You talk as we die,” were some of the angry voices by AIDS activists who protested Wednesday against failure by their governments to give them anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs). Some rolled on the ground as others shouted and marched through the 13th International Conference on AIDS in Africa (ICASA), stopping at government, pharmaceutical and donor stands. Donning T-shirts declaring their HIV status, the more than 100 activists under Pan-African HIV/AIDS Treatment Access Movement (PATAM), demanded drugs for people living with HIV/AIDS.