Associated Press
Friday, July 18, 2008

NEW YORK, July 17 -- Former president Bill Clinton's foundation has signed pricing agreements with several suppliers involved in making a malaria-fighting drug in an effort to stabilize the medication's fluctuating costs and ensure more dependable availability.

The former president in 2002 established an HIV-AIDS initiative that sought to negotiate lower prices for antiretroviral treatments, and he since has expanded his efforts to include malaria treatments such as artemisinin-based combination therapies, or ACTs.

Artemisinin is an extract of the plant known as wormwood. One of the factors making the price of artemisinin so volatile -- fluctuating from $155 to $1,100 per kilogram in recent years -- has been a wildly erratic cycle of shortage and excess of the extract, Clinton said Thursday.

"Today the supply as well as the demand have led to these dramatic fluctuations in prices," Clinton said, holding up a green clipping of the plant. "Our goal, among other things, is to make sure that this little plant is available in sufficient supply and that over time we can rationalize the prices."

Malaria sickens about 500 million people each year, and kills about 1 million.