[PEN-L:32550] WTO on drugs

["Ian Murray" <seamus2001@xxxxxxxxx>]

Monday, November 25, 2002

WTO Drug Access Negotiations Begin

By CLARE NULLIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

GENEVA -- Negotiators opened talks Monday at the World Trade Organization on
the issue of access to medicines in hopes of reaching a compromise by an
end-of-year deadline between the United States, which wants to protect its
pharmaceutical industry, and developing countries stricken by epidemics.

Diplomats entering the WTO headquarters were confronted with health
activists wheeling a "pneumonia victim" out of an ambulance to illustrate
the plight of the sick and poor who can not afford drugs taken for granted
by the rich.

"Rich countries pushed by the pharmaceutical giants, continue to block any
meaningful solution by insisting on unreasonable restrictions to the
legitimate right to health of hundreds of millions of poor people," said the
British aid group Oxfam, which organized the demonstration with Medecins
Sans Frontiers, also known as Doctors Without Borders.

At issue are the WTO rules on Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights. A
ministerial meeting in Qatar one year ago recognized the right of WTO
members to override patents on expensive Western drugs and make the products
themselves when public health is at stake.

However, drugs made under such "compulsory licensing" were to be used only
domestically and not exported. That meant a country without a drug industry
was no better off because it could neither make the drugs nor buy them from
another country.

Developing countries, led by South Africa and Brazil, reluctantly accepted
the declaration rather than cause the collapse of the bid to launch a wider
trade round. In return, the WTO's TRIPS council was instructed to solve the
problem by the end of this year.

Trade ministers made limited progress toward a compromise at a meeting in
Sydney earlier this month, but left the detailed legal drafting to
negotiators in Geneva.

TRIPS Council chairman, Eduardo Perez Motta of Mexico, wants to get
agreement this week because the council is not scheduled to meet again
before the end of the year.

Although there is general agreement that the least developed countries
should be given access to cheap generic drugs, there is no consensus on
whether this right should be automatically bestowed on wealthier developing
countries such as Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan.

There is also no agreement on whether to drop the usual patent protection
just for specific diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria - as
the United States wants - or for all diseases including cancer and diabetes.
Another difference is whether the more relaxed rules should cover public
health in general or be restricted to emergencies like epidemics.

A further sticking point is on which legal mechanism should be selected from
the WTO's horrendously complicated set of rules to implement the agreement.

MSF campaigner Ellen d'Hoen said that health activists were anxious for a
deal to be reached by the end of the year rather than being bogged down in
wider trade talks which were launched last year in Doha.

"But this should not be at the expense of developing countries being bounced
into something against their interests," she said.

The United States, in particular, and its pharmaceutical industry argue that
it needs safeguards to protect markets for drugs which cost millions of
dollars to develop otherwise there will be no more incentive for
manufacturers to invest in crucial research.