- Title: FRANCE: GAY ACTIVISTS PROTEST AT SHORTAGE OF NEW AIDS DRUG
- Date: 29th February 1996
- Summary: SAINT REMY SUR AVRE, FRANCE (FEBRUARY 29, 1996) (RTV (A) - ACCESS ALL) 1. SV HOMOSEXUAL RIGHTS GROUPS ACT-UP ACTIVISTS RUNNING TOWARDS FACTORY OF ABBOTT LABORATORIES 0.05 2. SV ACTIVISTS RUNNING INTO FACTORY 0.18 3. SV ACTIVISTS SOUNDING HORNS AND BLOWING WHISTLES IN FACTORY 0.25 4. SV ACTIVIST PRESSING BUTTON ON MACHINE,
- Embargoed: 15th March 1996 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: SAINT REMY SUR AVRE, FRANCE
- City:
- Country: France
- Reuters ID: LVA9TL4RSJWLW1E7KIVYNJ7HPSEO
- Story Text: Forty militant gay activists occupied a pharmaceutical company's laboratory on Thursday morning (February 29) in protest at the shortage of a new Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) drug.
The activists were all members of the homosexual rights group Act-Up. They took over a factory of Abbott Laboratories in Saint-Remy sur Avre, 60 miles (96 kilometres) west of Paris.
Protesters blocked entrances and productions lines and chained themselves to the plant's fences and grates.
Abbott has recently developed a new powerful AIDS drug, called Protease Inhibitors. Because of the huge demand for this new drug, there might be shortages.
Abbott said that there will not be sufficient supplies of the drug in the next few months for all AIDS sufferers in France.
The activists said the product was going to be available in all American pharmacies. They complain that if Abbott has stocks for 200,000 American sufferers, it should have enough for the 20,000 French ones.
AIDS support groups were outraged when it was suggested that there should be a lottery to decide which AIDS patients should be given the new drug.
On Wednesday, the French Prime Minister, Alain Juppe, said the idea was unacceptable.
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