JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, Oct. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Bristol-Myers Squibb Company , New York; Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas; and the governments of Lesotho and Swaziland announced that medical centers focused on caring for children with HIV/AIDS will be built in Maseru, Lesotho and Mbabane, Swaziland. Both centers are expected to be opened by December 2005.
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Sub-Saharan Africa is the world’s hardest hit region with the AIDS pandemic, and Lesotho and Swaziland are among the countries with the greatest prevalence of HIV and the greatest need for treatment and training to fight the disease.
The centers will be funded by grants from Bristol-Myers Squibb’s SECURE THE FUTURE(R) program. Since 1999, this initiative has provided more than 170 grants for treatment, medical research and community-based programs targeted to women and children who are infected with and affected by HIV in nine countries in southern and western Africa, including Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Mali and Senegal. Among the key objectives of SECURE THE FUTURE are to help build healthcare capacity in these countries, and develop sustainable approaches to addressing the HIV/AIDS crisis that can be replicated in other resource- limited settings.
The new centers will be staffed jointly by Baylor and health care professionals from Lesotho, Swaziland and southern Africa. In addition to caring for children, the centers -- each of which is located in the national capital -- will be used for training health care professionals and conducting research for this vulnerable population. The centers will be modeled on the Botswana-Baylor College of Medicine Children’s Clinical Center of Excellence at Princess Marina Hospital in Gaborone, Botswana, also funded by a SECURE THE FUTURE grant. Opened in June of 2003, the Botswana center currently cares for more than 1,200 HIV-infected children, one of the largest concentrations of HIV-infected children in care in any center worldwide. The new centers in Lesotho and Swaziland will be linked to other pediatric AIDS centers operated by Baylor around the world.
“We are proud to be working in partnership with Baylor and the governments of Lesotho and Swaziland to further expand this pioneering pediatric HIV/AIDS program,” John L. McGoldrick, Executive Vice President of Bristol-Myers Squibb, said in Johannesburg today. “Thousands of children in these countries are either infected with HIV/AIDS or orphaned as a result of it.” Mr. McGoldrick was here to participate in the SECURE THE FUTURE Technical Advisory Committee’s annual project review. He came here following visits to Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland to meet with government officials, and visit clinics and patients.
“We see our support of children’s HIV/AIDS centers as an important way for us to realize our mission of extending and enhancing human life,” said Peter R. Dolan, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Bristol-Myers Squibb. “We interpret that mission broadly, from supporting programs like SECURE THE FUTURE, to providing innovative therapies that address areas of serious unmet medical need, and expanding global access to medicines.”
“Baylor is extremely grateful to Bristol-Myers Squibb for funding the pediatric AIDS center in Botswana as well as the new centers in Lesotho and Swaziland. We have been fortunate to find funding from diverse sources for a growing children’s center network that now includes centers in Romania, Botswana, Mexico and Uganda. They represent the core of a growing children’s center network that will cooperate and collaborate on treatment, training and research,” said Mark W. Kline, M.D., Director, Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative, Baylor College of Medicine.
“These centers will be a major influence on training and research, and will have an impact not only in southern Africa but also across the world,” Dr. Kline said. The other centers are located in Constanta, Romania; Gaborone, Botswana; Mexico City, Mexico; Kampala, Uganda; and Benghazi, Libya. The Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative was established in 1996, and is the largest university-based program worldwide dedicated to improving the health and lives of HIV-infected children.
“Each of the new centers in southern Africa, like our other facilities, will be a comprehensive, state-of-the-art center of excellence, with a large outpatient clinic, procedure rooms, pharmacy, laboratory, medical library, conference center and offices,” Dr. Kline said. “Nutritional, psychological, social and child-life services will be provided along with comprehensive primary and HIV/AIDS specialty care.”
In addition to the pediatric facilities in southern Africa, other programs developed and operated through SECURE THE FUTURE grants include model community outreach, education and medical care sites in six countries; an HIV/AIDS curriculum that has been adopted by dozens of medical institutions worldwide; and a clinical reference laboratory in Botswana. SECURE THE FUTURE grants have also funded approximately 50 clinical research and training and education studies and programs, one of which resulted in development of a fast and low-cost CD4-count test for HIV. Other funded programs include: clinical trials related to opportunistic infections among HIV-infected patients, such as pneumonia and hepatitis B and C; trials in tuberculosis in HIV-infected patients; research related to antiretroviral treatment regimens; trials related to self-care, nutrition and other non-antiretroviral therapies; trials in mother-to-child transmission of HIV; a number of training and education programs, including a bi-directional physician exchange program between the U.S. and Africa and a nursing education program; and a range of laboratory and psychosocial studies.
SECURE THE FUTURE, a multi-year commitment of more than $115 million by Bristol-Myers Squibb and the Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, is the first and largest corporate initiative of its kind to fight HIV/AIDS.
Bristol-Myers Squibb is a global pharmaceutical and related health care products company whose mission is to extend and enhance human life.
The mission of the Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative is to promote health for all people through education, research, and public service. That mission is pursued by providing comprehensive medical and social services to HIV-infected and exposed infants and children; by sustaining excellence in educating U.S. and foreign health professionals; and by advancing clinical research.
Visit Bristol-Myers Squibb on the World Wide Web at: http://www.bms.com/
Visit SECURE THE FUTURE on the World Wide Web at: http://www.securethefuture.com/
Visit the Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative at: http://bayloraids.org/
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CONTACT: Wilson Grabill of Bristol-Myers Squibb, Corporate Affairs inJohannesburg until 10/28, +1-646-361-7795; or Ashleigh Fenwick of OgilvyPublic Relations, Johannesburg, South Africa, +27-11-880-2271; or Becky Taylorof Bristol-Myers Squibb, Corporate Affairs, Princeton, NJ, +1-609-252-4476; orLori Williams of Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, +1-713-798-4712,all for Bristol-Myers Squibb Company