Reporter's Notebook: Covering Clinton in Africa, Days 3 and 4

President Clinton chats up the press as we see the work his foundation is doing to combat AIDS in Zambia.

By Danna Harman | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

from the July 23, 2007 edition

Lusaka, Zambia - Over the weekend, in Zambia, former President Clinton spent a lot of time with us, the traveling press: On the plane, at meals, and late into the night in the hotel bar.

Each time, the pattern of our interaction was exactly the same: Someone would start off with a brief question, and Clinton would respond with a long, sweeping monologue, filled with often obscure facts, random figures, and mentions of dozens upon dozens of people by name, be they world leaders he had negotiated with or high school kids who had somehow impressed him along his way.

I had heard about his impressive, roaming intellect. It was something else to witness it. No matter whether the question was about the pricing of antiretroviral AIDS drugs, Hillary's run for the presidency, the problems between Hamas and Fatah in Gaza, or where he got his faded string bracelet (a traditional Colombian song-and-dance troupe gave it to him), the man had a lot to say.

He recommended websites, suggested books, boasted about his daughter, reflected on his days in the White House, and philosophized about Africa, about the change that is needed here, and about how he and others can and should help effect such change.

One of the Clinton Foundation's biggest successes to date is the role it has played in increasing the availability of high quality AIDS care and treatment for those in need.

By working with local governments, drug manufacturers, and organizations on the ground, the foundation has been a catalyst for helping push the price of antiretroviral drugs to less than half of what it was five years ago – and to make it easier for people to get and continue properly using those drugs.

Today, 69 developing countries are members of the Clinton Foundation's procurement consortium and have access to this pricing.

Here in Zambia, Clinton attended a soccer match and a ceremony celebrating the work of the foundation and the small strides that have been made here in the battle against this scourge.

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