New APAC trade agreement likely to limit AIDS drug access
Public health groups are warning that AIDS programs in Asia are under threat due to US demands in major trade talks.
Twelve countries, including Australia, are discussing the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, a massive new free trade deal in the Pacific region.
The US wants changes that would limit access to cheaper generic drugs in some of the world’s poorest countries, leaving millions without a treatment option.
According to the UN, the response to the AIDS crisis in Asia has proven a qualified success. New infection numbers are down and the death toll is decreasing.
However, advocates say the success is largely due to cheaper medicines made in Thailand and India.
Under a mid-1990s UN agreement known as TRIPS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights), drug companies allow the cheaper medicine to be supplied in poorer countries.
However, major pharmaceutical companies are pressing for greater control over patents in the medical field as part of the deal – changes that Rob Lake, the executive director of the Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations, says would restrict access to cheap drugs.
The US government is backing the stance of the pharmaceutical companies.
“In Australia, we probably pay somewhere between $15,000 to $20,000 a year per person for HIV medications,” he said. “A company in India is able to produce a generic variation for somewhere around $200.”
The trade negotiations have been going on for 18 months and are highly secret, but Mr Lake is pressing the Australian Government to convince the Federal Government to oppose the US.
“These drugs are lifelong drugs,” he said. “We don’t have a cure so at the moment we’re talking about lifelong treatment. The costs of these treatments to governments’ health systems are huge, even at $200 a head.”
He said the pharmaceutical companies could not claim they required changes to patent laws as a matter of necessity.
“Their profits are in the billions, and so they’re already making these profits, and they’re making these profits in the developed world,” he said. “These are not lost profits to them.”
A spokesman for the Trade Minister Andrew Robb says the negotiating position includes advice on the impact in developing countries.
He says the Government is trying to find the right balance between promoting investment in new drugs and supporting affordable access to medicines.
Source: Radio Australia
Category: Features, Pharmaceuticals
