The Geneva Principle was a landmark victory for AIDS activists who not only won their place at the table, but were now empowered to help plan the menu. The Geneva Principle is in some ways a metaphor for the transformation of the physician-patient relationship from a theocracy into a partnership in which treatment decisions are often shared and respect the patient's autonomy. More than any other disease, AIDS has helped restore the patient rather than medical technology as the proper focus of medicine.
Autonomy demands empowerment.
It is therefore appropriate that such empowerment manifest itself in participation of the drug approval process, disease prevention, healthcare resource allocation, and in the treatment of one's disease. A respect of patients' autonomy also mandates a primary role for the patient community in the access to timely clinical and scientific data that could impact their survival and quality of life. It might therefore seem appropriate to some that such access extend to the organization of medical conferences in which data affecting survival and quality of life are presented. But such logic is fuzzy at best. A patient's autonomy does not have any relationship to the organization and conduct of the presentation and exchange of scientific and clinical data between physicians.