사이드바 영역으로 건너뛰기

강혁이 한국가는 일정 확정

이번 여름에 강혁이는 한국에 간다.

여기서 캠프 보내는 대신,

한국 가서 한국말좀 많이 배워 오라고

학교 방학하자마자 가서 학교 개학할 때쯤 돼서 오는 걸로 일정을 짰다.

 

원래 좀 싼 60일 안에 돌아오는 비행기표를 샀었는데,

오늘 이모와 통화하면서 일정을 바꿨다.

그래서 벌금에, 올라간 비행기 삯 ㅠ.

비행기값만 1500불이 넘는다 ㅜ.

66일에 여길 떠나고 826일에 한국을 떠나는 일정으로 확정!

이젠 못 바꿈...

진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

강혁이 시험 성적

쓴 김에 강혁이 거 하나 더

지난 주에 강혁이 시험 성적표가 왔다.

한국으로 치면 전국 모의고사 성적표쯤 되는 거

 



내년에도 이렇게 잘할지 모르겠다고 한 거다.

 

근데 이번에는 작년보다도 훨씬 더 잘했다. ;)

성적을 석차를 매기는 건 아니고

전국으로 봤을 때 몇 퍼센타일에 속하는지

잘사는 지역 공립학교 애들하고 비교하면 어떤지

그리고 사립학교 애들하고 비교하면 어떤지

이렇게 보여준다.

 

전국학생으로 보면 전부 다 99%

잘사는 지역 공립학교로 보면 99%는 아니고 대부분 95% 이상

사립학교 애들과 비교하면 영어는 전부 90% 이상 수학은 96% 99% 정도 였던 것 같음

(작년에는 영어 쪽에서 많이 떨어졌었다)

 

강혁이도 기분 좋아하고

 

그런데 선생님 걱정도 같이 왔다.

성적이 좋을 수도 있고 나쁠 수도 있지만

더 중요한 건, 평소에 공부를 어떻게 하는지,

숙제를 얼마나 잘 하는지다 라면서

 

강혁이가 요즘 숙제를 잘 해가나 몰라.
진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

It took 60 years that you look this good

오늘 내가 일하고 있는Channing Laboratory Respiratory Epidemiology group의 Director인

Scott Weiss 60회 생일파티에 갔다.

얼마전에 email을 받은 것도 같긴 한데 그렇다고 갈 생각은 없었는데

Roz의 비서가 오더니 너 거기 안가냐? 거기 가서 얼굴이라도 내밀어야 좋지 않겠냐

하는 바람에 갔다.



이 사람, Harvard와 인연맺은지는 34, Channing에서 일한지는 30년이란다.

스포츠광이라고 뭔가 스포츠 스타 자서전쯤 되는 책 (멀리 있어서 잘 못 받음)

선물로 받았다.

그리고 그전에 Channing의 장이었던 Frank Speizer가 멀리서 선물을 보내왔다.

T 셔츠였는데, 사실 거기 써있는 문구가 맘에 와 닿아서 이걸 쓰는 것이다.

제대로 기억하고 있는지는 몰라도 뭐 이런 거 비슷했던 것 같다.

It took 60 years that you look this good.

뭐라고 번역해야 하나

직역하자면 네가 이렇게 근사하게 보이게 되는데 60년 걸렸다 라는 거지만

그것보다는 60년이 되어도 이렇게 근사하다 뭐 이렇게 하는게 낫지 않을까.

어쨋든 좋은 얘기다.

나도 멀지 않았는데, 60살이 되어도 이 사람처럼 근사해지지는 않을 것 같고

 

이 사람 뭐라고 한말씀 하셨는데

벌써 다 잊어버렸다. .

기억에 남는 건, 지난 2주전쯤에 자기 CV를 정리하면서 보니

자기 이름이 들어간 논문이 500개더라는 것과

자기가Frank Speizer에게서 1996년에 이 과를 넘겨받았을 때는

교수가 6, Grant에서 받는 Direct cost 1.6 million이었는데,

지금은 교수만 25, Direct cost 60 million 이라는

엄청 성공한 사람이지

걸어오면서 내 논문이 지금은 몇개고 앞으로 몇개나 될까 생각해 보았다.

 

며칠 전에도 이사람 얘기를 들었었는데,

실패해 보아야 성공할 수 있다 뭐 그런 얘기

자기가 아는 천재 얘길 하면서

누군지 이름은 잊었지만, 그 사람 진짜 천재라면서, 한 번도 실패해본적이 없었는데

Grant를 내도 다 쉽게 받았었고, 뭘 해도 실패한 적이 없었다는

그런데 얼마전에 를 냈는데 리젝트를 당했단다.

이사람 엄청 화내면서 다시 제출하기를 거부했다는

그래서 결국Harvard를 그만두고 어딘가 후진 데로 갔다는 얘기.

좀 젊었을 때 실패해보고 적응해보았어야 했었다는 얘기.

 

그에 비하면 자기는 엄청 못했었다는 얘기자주 한다.

자기 Mentor는 맨날Frank Speizer한테 가서 자기 너무 못한다고 불평했었고.

Grant 처음 냈을 때는 점수 엄청 형편없이 나와서

이 사람은 그냥 진료나 하지 연구자로서는 성공하기 어렵겠다는 얘기도 들었다 하고.

이사람 말도 좀 더듬는다

그렇지만 자기는 솔직하게 자기 얘기 다 하고 한게 도움이 되는 것 같다고.

자기같은 사람도 성공할 수 있다 뭐 그런 얘기도 하고

 

어쨋는 이런 모임은 Fear-generating meeting이다.

 


진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

지난 주 (4/3-4/9/2006) 기록

한 김에 지나 주 일도 간단히 기록

하려고 했으나...

기억이 안 난다... 흑



일요일

RC workshop이 있어서 아침에 갔다가 애들 한글학교 데려다 주려고

중간에 나와서 전화를 하니 강혁이가 뭔 일이 있어 학교를 못 간다고... TT

하여 집에 와서 있다가 제시간 맞춰 성당 갔다.

성당에서 김*옥 선생을 만나 반석회 소개시켜 주고

반석회의 김*련 선생 집에 전기가 고장났는데 좀 봐달라는 부탁을 받고

(나 말고 남편이)

강혁이 집에 데려다 놓고 (강욱이는 축구 때문에 성당에 안 갔음)

가서 보고 같이 북경2에 가서 저녁 먹고 옴

 

토요일

강혁이가 MIT 끝나고 바로 축구 시합으로 갔어야 했기 때문에

내가 강욱이를 데리고 집에 왔다.

그리고는 별일 없이 집에서 다음주 UCLA group conference call 준비한 듯...

 

금요일

아침에 강혁이가 목이 아프다고 해서 Bedford에 있는 Patriot Pediatric에 데려감.

그리고는 뭘 했는지 아무 생각이 없다. 기억상실

 

목요일

아침에 Violence group meeting을 했다. 별 내용은 없었고,

Roz 가 자기 Kuwait에 갔다온 얘기 좀 하고 (그냥 잡담으로)

우리 questionnaire에 있는 childhood sexual abuse의 reference를 뭘로 할 건가를 확정하고

내 WEB and smoking paper response를 어떻게 할 건지에 관해서 좀 얘기하고

Emily가 자기가 Violence data 가지고 IPV와 alcohol을 주제로 K-grant를 써볼까 한다는 얘기도 하고...

이게 기억나는 거 전부

 

수요일

기억이 없다. 아마도 UCLA group과 같이 하는 smoking trend in NHS data 분석을 했을 것...

저녁에 RC class 간 것만 적혀 있군...

 

화요일

적어 놓은 게 없어서 기억이 안난다...

저녁때 Mom's support group에 간 것만 기억이 남...

 

월요일

아침에 Cambridge에 갔고,

**양 집에 가서 일하다가

같이 Kennedy school에서 하는 Seminar 갔다가

사무실에 같이 나오고

그 다음은 블랙
진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

이번 주 정리

간단히 이번주 일을 정리해보면...

 

월요일에는 

UCLA 간호대 교수와 하는 "smoking and quality of life" project conference call.

내가 한 거 전부 다 훑지도 못하고 Figure 몇 개 보다가 끝났다.

 



Channing Epidemiology Seminar

내가 발표하는 날이었기 때문에

아침에 만든 슬라이드 보고 연습하고 고치고 연습하고 고치고 그러고 갔다.

내가 Channing에서 속한 group은 Respiratory Epidemiology 인데

내가 하는 일은 Nurses Health Study이고,

이날 발표는 Respiratory Epi turn이었기 때문에

NHS 쪽에서는 아무도 안 오고, Respiratory 쪽에서는 주제가 재미없어서 안 오고

하여 거의 아무도 없는 가운데 발표를 ㅠ.ㅠ

 

수요일. 

아침에 강혁이가 목도 아프고 가슴까지 아프다고 울고불고 하여 좀 자라고 하고

11시쯤 일어나서 밥 먹는 거 보고 나왔다.

원래 Korean Suicide project meeting 하는 날이었는데 시간이 안 되어 하루 미루고,

월요일 UCLA group 과의 conference call에 참여하지 못했던 Diane이 와서

project에 대해서 얘기를 했다.

이 여자 옛날에 내가 이 project의 second author 라도 하겠다는 걸

냉랭하게 거절했던 아픈 기억이 있는 여잔데...

어제는 와서 UCLA group에서 너무 많은 걸 요구한다면서,

요구중의 일부는 거절하자고 했다.

아니면 내가 관심이 있으면, 나를 first author로 한다는 조건으로 일을 하던가...

내 대답은 내 입장에서는 first author로 한다면 좋기는 하지만,

내가 요즘 너무 바빠서 할 수 있을지 모르겠다...

어쨌든 그래도 senior researcher라 그냥 UCLA group에서 하자는 대로 하지는 않고

(내용이 너무 실망이란다. 사실 좀 그렇다...) 좀 고쳐보자고...

 

목요일. 

Korean Suicide project meeting을 한 다음

갑자기 발동이 걸려서 reference 찾고, SAS program 짜고 했다.

한참 전에 온 Data를 보니 SPSS data로 되어 있어서

저녁에 집에 가면서 SAS로 바꿔달라고 email을 보냈는데,

집에 가서 보니 SAS로 바꾼 file이 와 있었다. 그래서 일 시작...

(***, 왜 SAS program 안 보내는 겨!)

 

오늘은 

WEB and smoking paper revision 하는 거 해야 하는데...
진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

가난한 사람들의 병

New York Time에 실렸다는 글.

누군가가 email로 몇번을 보내서 어쩌다 읽어보게 된 글이다.

가난한 나라 사람들은 미국이나 유럽 사람들이 걸리는 병에 걸려야 그나마 치료약을 얻을 수 있지, 이 나라 사람들이 다 나아버린 경우에는 치료약이 있어도, 제약회사에서 생산을 중단해버려 구할 수가 없다는 얘기

 

몇 가지 예를 들었는데,

첫번째는 sleeping sickness.

간단히 얘기하자면 원래 항암제로 쓰던 eflornithine 이라는 약이 잘 들어서 썼는데, 그 약이 항암제로서의 효력이 그다지 높지 않아 제약회사에서 생산을 중단해 버렸고, 이 약이 이 sleeping sickness에는 아주 잘 들어서 어떻게 생산하도록 해 보려 했으나 실패했고, 어느날 여성의 facial hair의 성장을 방지하는 약으로 다시 나타났다는 얘기 

 

두번째는 어린이용 HIV 치료제

신생아가 감염이 되는 경우는 엄마한테서 오는 경우인데, 그걸 방지하는 좋은 약이 있단다.

근데 약이 좋아서 미국 같은 경우는 임신하면 HIV Test를 거의 100%하고 양성으로 나타나면 이 약을 투여하기 때문에 엄마한테 감염되는 경우가 거의 없어졌단다. 그런데 이게 가난한 나라의 아이들한테는 좋은 소식이 아니란다. 돈이 없어서 임신중 HIV Test를 못하는 가난한 나라의 엄마한테서 태어난 아이들은 미국 같은 나라에 어린이 HIV 환자가 없기때문에 치료받을 약도 생산이 안된단다.

 

말라리아 얘기도 있고, 결핵 얘기도 있지만 일해야 되니깐 여기서 줄임...



NY Times - March 29, 2006

Talking Points

 

The Scandal of 'Poor People's Diseases'

By TINA ROSENBERG

 

It's hard to imagine how a Rwandan woman with AIDS might be considered lucky, but in a way, she is. Effective drugs exist to treat her disease, and their price has dropped by more than 98 percent in the last six years. Research speeds ahead on treatments and vaccines. Although much more needs to be done, the world takes AIDS seriously: rich countries provide money, drug companies have lowered their prices and accepted generic competition, and poor countries like Rwanda are scrambling to provide free treatment to all who need it. None of this is true for people who suffer from malaria, tuberculosis, or a host of other diseases that citizens of rich countries haven't even heard of—like kala azar, sleeping sickness and Chagas disease. Even children with AIDS are out of luck compared to their parents.

 

All these diseases have been abandoned in some important way. For some, no good treatments exist and there is little attempt to invent them. For others, effective drugs exist, but aren't being made. Or those drugs are so expensive that poor people and poor countries have no hope of buying them. Most of these diseases are easily preventable and completely curable. Saving the lives of their sufferers is much cheaper and easier than treating AIDS. Yet millions of people die of them. Why the difference?

 

As fatal illnesses go, AIDS is the best one for a poor person to catch because rich people get it, too. The other diseases might as well hang out a sign: "Poor People Only." They offer researchers no profitable market. They have little political constituency. There is no well-connected group of sufferers who stage protests and lobby pharmaceutical companies and Congress to develop better medicines or make existing ones more available. The response to disease is political: the illnesses of invisible people usually stay invisible.

 

Five years ago, that would have been the end of the story. Today, however, for the best known of these diseases—malaria and tuberculosis—the bleak outlook is starting to change. They are slowly beginning to get the attention, money and research merited by the world's top killers.

 

People with AIDS all over the world are fortunate to have fellow sufferers in America and Europe. They are even more fortunate that many are middle-class gay men. These men have lots of education, leisure time and income (and usually no kids to spend it on). They are predominantly urban, well-connected and ultra-sophisticated. Their buying power provided pharmaceutical companies with a lucrative market for AIDS drugs. And they lobby. Groups such as ACT UP, which began in the 1980's fighting for the rights of their own members, are now savvy advocates for that woman in rural Rwanda. In poor countries as well, it helps that AIDS strikes all social classes. Brazil would never have become the first poor country to guarantee free AIDS treatment to all who need it without the activism of its many homosexual organizations. For every AIDS victim, though, there are many more suffering from diseases that lack this kind of constituency. Today, contracting a serious disease that affects only poor people is the worst luck of all.

 

I. How a Beauty Regime Salvaged a Cure for Sleeping Sickness

 

The story of sleeping sickness is a scandalous illustration of the politics of neglected diseases ~W and of how much wealthy people drive the global medical market. After malaria, sleeping sickness is the most deadly parasitic disease. It is endemic in 36 African countries and is always fatal if it is not treated. The cure used in most places is melarsoprol—an arsenic-based drug so toxic that it collapses each vein into which it is injected and kills between two and eight percent of those who take it. There is another cure, eflornithine, so effective that it is called the "resurrection drug"—it makes people in comas get up and walk.

 

Eflornithine is an old anticancer drug that turned out to be not very effective against cancer. In the mid-1990's, the company that made the drug stopped making it. The fact that it was extraordinarily effective at treating sleeping sickness didn't matter, because victims of that disease had little money to pay for it. After it stopped production, the company, which is now known as Sanofi-Aventis, licensed the drug to the World Health Organization, which together with the medical charity Doctors Without Borders, searched for another manufacturer. But by 2000, the existing stocks of eflornithine were dwindling and no other manufacturer was interested. It looked as though the miracle cure would disappear. Then lightening struck. Eflornithine reappeared in a six-page ad in Cosmopolitan magazine as the active ingredient in the Bristol- Myers Squibb product, Vaniqa, a new cream that impedes the growth of women's facial hair. Doctors Without Borders, which had just won the Nobel Peace Prize and was launching an initiative to find cures for neglected diseases, seized the opportunity to launch a publicity campaign. Christiane Amanpour went to southern Sudan to report on eflornithine for "60 Minutes."

 

The predecessor to Sanofi-Aventis, which still controlled the rights to the drug, eventually agreed to donate a five-year supply, plus money for research, surveillance and training of health care workers, in a package totaling $25 million. The donation runs out this year, but there is a good chance it will be renewed. A Bristol-Myers Squibb spokesman inadvertently summed up the plight of sleeping sickness in 2001: "Before Vaniqa came on the scene, there was no reason to make eflornithine at all. Now there's a reason." The market agrees with him. Saving American complexions is a reason. Saving African lives, apparently, is not.

 

II. Why the Youngest AIDS Victims Suffer Most

 

AIDS in adults is a global focus of concern. AIDS in children, however, has been ignored.

 

Last year, 570,000 children died of the disease in poor countries, and 700,000 children became infected with H.I.V. Children should not be getting H.I.V. in the first place. Most of them acquire the virus in the womb, at birth or through breastfeeding. Infection is easily preventable with a drug that costs about a dollar per treatment. In many countries, the drug's producer, Boehringer-Ingelheim, provides it for free. It should be used everywhere in the world. But it is not. When children do become infected with H.I.V., there should be a good antiretroviral treatment for them, as there is with adults. But there isn't. Only about 40,000 children worldwide receive lifesaving antiretroviral drugs to combat AIDS. Children's antiretrovirals are expensive. Even in generic form, they cost three or four times the price of adult drugs. The syrups for young children taste terrible. The cheapest option for older children is to take the generic adult pills, broken by a caregiver into halves or thirds. But this poses a risk of underdosing or overdosing, as a half a pill doesn't necessary contain half its active ingredient.

 

Since most children with AIDS got the disease from their mothers, most sick kids are being raised by a grandmother or raising themselves. This makes having child-friendly medications even more crucial. One of the most important reasons the AIDS treatment revolution has bypassed kids is that pediatric AIDS is now almost exclusively a third-world disease. Virtually all pregnant women in Europe and North America get AIDS tests. Those who are H.I.V.-positive are either given antiretroviral therapy or a drug to cut mother-to-child transmission of the virus. In 1990, 321 infants were born with H.I.V. in New York City. In 2003, only five were. This is wonderful news for wealthy countries. But it has a deadly side effect: it means there is no more paying market for pediatric AIDS medicines, and no lobbying by those whose children have gotten sick. One result is a dearth of affordable child-friendly drugs. Former President Bill Clinton's foundation has negotiated cheaper prices for generic pediatric AIDS medicines   from Cipla, an Indian manufacturer, but this only covers a few drugs.

 

The disappearance of pediatric AIDS from rich countries harms African children in more subtle ways as well. AIDS doctors and nurses in poor nations need clinical training in how to treat small patients whose doses must change as they grow. But there are few doctors with experience treating pediatric AIDS—they come from places that either don't have the problem, or that don't have the solution. Not much research exists about the long-term effects of antiretroviral drugs on kids. There has been little push to improve diagnostic tests or bring down their price—a serious problem, because the most widely used tests do not work in children under 18 months old.

 

III. Why One Million Africans a Year Die of Malaria

 

Malaria used to be common as far north as Canada and Britain. It killed Oliver Cromwell. Shakespeare refers to it, as "ague," in eight of his plays. But today, many Americans don't even realize it is still around. Malaria is all but invisible despite the fact that it is one of the world's top killers, with over a million victims a year in Africa alone. It is the leading cause of death for children under five in Africa. Because rural children don't lobby, malaria is ignored even in Africa. Governments have come to accept a million child deaths as the natural order of things.

 

Malaria's victims suffer from their invisibility. One way is through lack of money to fight the disease. International organizations and aid agencies talk a lot about malaria. But they have not backed their talk with money. The solutions they push have been things poor people can buy for themselves, because most donors are unwilling to finance more effective measures. All over Africa, a main cure for malaria is chloroquine. The great advantage of chloroquine is that it costs only a few pennies, so even poor African families can buy it. It just has one small problem—in most places it doesn't work. The parasite has become resistant to it. There is a new, effective cure, called artemisinin-based combination therapy. Countries should be switching to it rapidly, but they are not, because it's much more expensive—around $1.40 for an adult cure, 40 cents for a child. That doesn't seem like much to save a life, but it's more than most malaria-stricken families can afford. That means rich-country donors would have to pay. Until recently, they haven't.

 

Now the United Nations' Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is starting to help countries switch to a malaria cure that actually works. Wealthy nations are also eager to help prevent the spread of malaria—as long as it doesn't cost much. The hot prevention tool today is an insecticide-treated net to hang over a bed. These bed nets are very effective, if people can get them. But people can't, because donors don't want to give them away. Even at the subsidized price of three dollars, the cost is high enough so that people living on a dollar a day do not buy them. One survey asked rural Africans what they would buy if they had the money. A bed net was sixth on the list. The first three items were a radio, a bicycle and, heartbreakingly, a plastic bucket.

 

Bed net sale programs generally do not work. In contrast, the country of Togo in 2004 gave away bed nets during its national measles vaccination days. Everyone who brought a child to be inoculated got a free bed net, or a voucher for one. Virtually overnight, Togo acquired an effective form of malaria prevention for most of its young children. But this is a solution many donors seem unwilling to finance.

 

The United States, of course, didn't beat malaria with bed nets. It killed mosquitoes with insecticide—something that African nations also did with much success half a century ago. Today, South Africa and Mozambique have drastically reduced malaria cases with a program to spray the insides of houses with small amounts of insecticide once or twice a year. Why don't other nations do this? Because it requires government financing, and that means rich countries have to pay. So far, they remain reluctant.

 

The truth is that many malaria victims would be better off if America still had the disease. If malaria still existed in America, we would be attacking it with DDT. In fact, we did exactly that. America sprayed DDT in large quantities on crops and cities. This was extremely irresponsible and did terrible environmental harm. But now we know that DDT can beat malaria without environmental damage, if it is used as it is in South Africa, sprayed in tiny amounts inside houses. DDT, however, is banned in the United States and Europe. That means that Washington has not, until the last few months, financed its use anywhere else and it has blocked the World Health Organization from issuing recommendations to use DDT. American officials maintained it was hypocritical to push an insecticide overseas that is banned at home. Americans are beginning to realize, however, that it is more hypocritical to deny Africa the ability to use responsibly the tools we used irresponsibly to beat malaria. Last year, President Bush announced a new program to fight malaria in Africa that he says will provide an additional $1.2 billion over the next five years. Such promises have a way of drying up, especially when they concern programs with little political constituency. But the program is well-conceived. It will give away bed nets, buy malaria drugs that work and finance indoor spraying. Eight countries in Africa are due to start spraying this year, and three will use DDT as their primary insecticide.

 

IV. Tuberculosis, Another Overlooked Killer

 

To many, tuberculosis is a disease of the past, reminiscent of Keats, the Bronte sisters, and a time when it was it was a death sentence all over the world. But it is only the cure that is outdated.

 

The current cure for TB involves taking a six- to nine-month course of four drugs, the newest of which is 40 years old. The currently used—and not very effective—TB vaccine was invented 80 years ago. The most commonly used diagnostic method is hit-or-miss, and it doesn't work at all on people with AIDS. Until very recently, there was no research designed to solve any of these problems. But while the treatment of TB remains mired in the past, TB is, unfortunately, a disease of the future. Once thought to be disappearing, it has roared back, propelled by AIDS. In sub-Saharan Africa, TB cases are rising at six percent a year. One third of the world lives with the TB bacillus in latent form. When AIDS degrades a person's immune system, it activates TB, which has now become the number one AIDS-related killer. In some parts of Africa, 75 percent of people with AIDS also have TB. And they tend to be the poorest. Sons of presidents get AIDS, too, but they are unlikely to get tuberculosis. That has helped keep the disease invisible even as the numbers soar.

 

Five years ago, however, something happened. With financing from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, researchers and public health officials created the TB Alliance. It scours universities and corporations for compounds—both existing drugs and brand new ideas—that might have promise against TB. It negotiates rights to these substances, then raises money to develop and test them, and to obtain regulatory approval—the things no drug company is interested in doing. A companion organization is doing the same for TB vaccines, and another one is taking on TB diagnostic tests. As a result, a drug pipeline that once held nothing now has several promising compounds in clinical trials that might allow a faster, less toxic TB cure.

 

The story of poor people's diseases has not been a happy one, but things are finally beginning to look up. From 1975 to 1999, only 13 new drugs for neglected diseases were invented. Since 2000, however, 63 new compounds have been put into development, including 18 that are in clinical trials. Most of these new compounds are being managed by groups like the TB Alliance, which go by the unwieldy name of public-private partnerships. These groups ~W including the Medicines for Malaria Venture , the Malaria Vaccine Initiative , and the  International AIDS Vaccine Initiative ~W are starting to bring real hope to the problem of third world diseases. One World Health is a nonprofit pharmaceutical company that is trying to find cures for illnesses like diarrhea and Chagas disease. Its first product, a cure for a deadly tropical parasite called visceral leishmaniasis, which infects 500,000 people a year, is about to be submitted to India's drug regulatory agency for approval. Doctors Without Borders has its own organization, the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative. The big pharmaceutical companies are also starting to pay more attention. Novartis, AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline have established research labs dedicated to tropical diseases, and many of the largest drug companies are donating medicines. Several companies have programs to work on diseases in specific African countries.

 

One reason for the surge of interest is AIDS itself. Although many researchers who work on malaria and TB resent the fact that AIDS has hogged most of the attention and financing, the disease has awakened world interest in Africa and poor-country diseases. The pharmaceutical industry has also learned an important lesson with AIDS. Its efforts to maintain high prices and keep out cheap generic drugs—even from poor countries that would not be able to buy brand name medicines—led to worldwide notoriety, and even public comparisons with the tobacco companies. The industry has not reformed. The companies have successfully pushed Washington to negotiate clauses in free trade deals that will make it harder for some of the world's most miserable countries to get generic drugs. But they have begun programs of research and donations of drugs for neglected diseases in part as a way to burnish their image.

 

The AIDS pandemic has also given birth to the United Nations' Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which has become a remarkably efficient ongoing source of money, although one hobbled by wealthy governments' stinginess. The partnerships and the pharmaceutical companies can now be assured that someone with money will buy a new AIDS, TB or malaria drug. They may not make a profit, but they won't take a loss. The other reason for the sudden visibility of poor-country diseases is the establishment of the Gates Foundation, which has $5.8 billion in active global health grants at the moment. There is probably not a single major organization working on any kind of vaccine, diagnostic tool, cure or treatment for any poor country disease that does not get much or most of its financing from the Gates Foundation.

 

When he began his philanthropy in 1994, Bill Gates was looking to locate and fix market failures and get a lot of results for the buck. He certainly has done that. But how many people have died unnecessarily if one person—albeit one very rich person—can stimulate so much progress in reversing a planet's worth of neglect?

 

Lela Moore contributed research for this article.


진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

4월 5일 수요일 아침

눈이 오고 있다.

지난 주에는 봄도 없이 여름이 오나 할 정도로 더운 날씨였는데...

사진을 찍어서 올려야지... (나중에)

 

진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

2006 State Championship Chess Tournament

 

지난 일요일 1시에 하는 강혁이 한글학교에 맞춰서 가려고

(우리는 Massachusetts 서부 끝에 있는 Hancock이라는 곳에 있었다)

아침 일찍 일어나 (아침 8시에 일어났으나,

Day light saving 이 시작되는 날이었기 때문에 7시에 일어난 거나 마찬가지)

아침을 챙겨먹고 보스톤으로 길을 나섰는데,

떠난 지 얼마 안되어서 남편 전화기로 전화가 왔다.




남편 왈 “전화 잘못 거셨나본데요 (물론 영어로)” 이랬다.

운전하고 있던 남편, 전화를 나한테 넘겼고, 강혁이 학교 Chess 선생이 전화를 한 것.

수개월 전 Chess Team Tournament가 있는데 강혁이가 참석할 건가 email로 물어왔고,

내가 강혁이한테 물어서 그렇게 하기로 했던 기억이 순식간에 머릿속에 스쳐 지나갔다.

그나저나 이 Chess 선생, 엄청 열 받은 듯,

지금2006 Hurvitz Cup/State Team Championship가 시작했고 강혁이까지 끼워 네 명이 한 팀인데,

강혁이가 없으면 팀 구성이 안 되고 다른 애들이 엄청 실망할텐데

안오면 어떡하냐고 전화로 엄청 딱딱거렸다.

할 수 없이 미안하지만 여기는 Berkshire, Massachusetts 주 서부 끝인데

거기까지 가려면 한 세 시간은 걸리겠는데, 그래도 괜찮겠냐고 묻고,

그래도 안 오는 거보다는 오는 게 낫다 이래서

90번 고속도로 엄청 밟고

Chess Tournament가 열리는 Natick High School까지 2시간여 만에 주파...

가보니 다행히 대회 관리가 제대로 안 되어서 아직 1회밖에 안했고,

1회는 강혁이는 안 왔으니 기권패고 나머지 3명은 다 이겼다고,

Chess 선생 얼굴이 많이 펴져 있었다.

일단 강혁이를 떨어뜨려 놓고 나머지 세 명은 집으로 가서 점심 먹고,

나는 Tournament가 언제 끝날지 모르니, 다시 Natick High School로 와서 기다리고 있었다.

결과는 강혁이네 학교가 2등...

강혁이가 첫회에 기권패를 하지 않았으면 1등을 넘볼수도 있었다는 소문은 있었지만, 뭐 할 수 없지.

어쨌든 트로피 타고 메달 받고 해서 애들은 신이 났다.

내가 보기에는 Chess 중간중간에 애들끼리 논 게 더 재미있었던 것 같다.

 

 

누가 주도했는지는 몰라도 단체로 T-shirts도 맞춰 입었다. Chess Game 끝나고 중간에 쉬면서 공놀이를 하고 있다.


Chess를 하는 모습. 오른쪽이 강혁이네 학교 팀이고 왼쪽은 다른 학교 팀. 강혁이는 맨 끝에 있어 잘 안보인다.


진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

강혁이 근황

강혁이는 지금 봄방학중... 3월 20일부터 31일까지 2주일간

다니는 학교가 강욱이와 달라 방학도 다르다.

강욱이도 함께 방학이었으면 둘이 놀았을 텐데

맨날 집에서 혼자 놀고 있다.

영화도 보고

게임도 하고

엄마가 사다준 수학 문제집도 풀고

책도 읽고 (학교에서 인종문제에 대한 걸 배워서

내가 “달리는 기차에 중립은 없다”를 사줬는데 아직 안 읽고 있다.

매일 SF물이나 읽고 있으니 네오나 홍실과는 대화가 잘 되려나?)

또 뭘 하나?

좀 미안한 마음이 들기도 하여

이번 주말에는 산에라도 가볼까 하고 있다.

 

 

진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크

첫째로 살기

한가지 재미있는 사실

강혁이네 학교에 부모들을 보면 애들을 달달 볶는 사람들이 있다.

이것도 하지 마라, 저것도 하지 마라. 인터넷은 몇 분만 할 수 있다.

메신저는 절대 안된다. 휴대전화도 안된다 등등등



애들이 다 첫째라는 점이다.

첫째는 부모도 처음이라 어찌해야 할 지를 모르고

이것저것 간섭도 많이 하고 규제도 많이 하는 것 같다.

둘째는 그냥 거의 모든 게 OK

사실 우리도 그런 면에서 남들이 보면 강욱이를 달달 볶는다고 하겠지.
진보블로그 공감 버튼트위터로 리트윗하기페이스북에 공유하기딜리셔스에 북마크