The Nation : Senate OKs Funds to Defray Cost of AZT

The Senate passed legislation to provide $15 million in emergency funding to AIDS patients to help defray the cost of the treatment drug AZT. The measure by Sen. Lowell P. Weicker Jr. (R-Conn.) would provide $10 million in emergency funding through March 31, 1989, by reprogramming money already allocated to the Department of Health and Human Services. It also would allocate an additional $5 million contributed by the only supplier of AZT, Burroughs-Wellcome Pharmaceutical Co. “For 6,000 patients, AZT represents the only hope for prolonging their lives as research continues for a cure for AIDS,” said Sen. Pete Wilson (R-Calif.), a co-sponsor. “At $8,000 a year, the cost is prohibitively high, forcing patients to choose between poverty and treatment.”