[Ip-health] Globe & Mail: Generic drug makers seek export rights

[Richard Elliott]

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[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]

The Globe & Mail (Report on Business)
Thursday, September 11, 2003
Page B1, B6.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030911.rdrug11/BNStory=
/Business/

Generic drug makers seek export rights
Association wants change to Canadian law

By STEVEN CHASE

CANCUN, MEXICO =97 Canada's generic drug makers are pressing Ottawa for the
right to export copies of patented drugs to poor countries that don't have
facilities to make their own.

The Canadian Generic Pharmaceutical Association yesterday wrote
International Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew, who is in Cancun for World
Trade Organization talks, asking Ottawa to change patent law to allow them
to manufacture, for export only, drugs that are still under a patent.

The CGPA initiative comes shortly after WTO countries sealed a deal Aug. 31
that would allow developing countries to import cheap copies of patented
drugs to fight health emergencies from malaria to AIDS without facing
lawsuits over patent infringement.

Such a request would hand a big dilemma to the federal Liberal government,
which has been hawkish on protecting the rights of drug patent holders but
considers itself a champion of developing countries.

"As you may know, for [our] member companies and Canada to fully
participate in providing lower-cost generic pharmaceuticals to people in
developing countries that so desperately need them, changes to the export
restrictions of Canada's Patent Act are required," CGPA president Jim Keon
wrote in a letter dated yesterday.

"Currently, these export restrictions prohibit the production and export of
products under Canadian patent protection, even if the product is not
protected in the country where it is to be sold."
Under federal law, no one can make a generic copy of a patented drug in
Canada for about 20 years.

Mr. Keon said the restrictions that currently prevent generic drug makers
from copying patented drugs have already prevented Canadian companies from
helping poorer countries in recent years.
"These are the same export restrictions that, in the summer of 2000,
prevented Canadian generic pharmaceutical manufacturer Apotex from being
able to fulfill its offer to provide HIV/AIDS drugs to developing countries
in sub-Saharan Africa at cost," he told Mr. Pettigrew in his letter.

Mark Fried, spokesman for development group Oxfam International, said the
Aug. 31 WTO deal, while positive, has set up a very bureaucratic system
that poor countries have to follow to get copies of brand name drugs.

He called it a gift "bound tightly in red tape" that leaves the door open
for any move to get cheap drugs to be challenged by the WTO -- an agreement
that could discourage smaller generic drug manufacturing countries from
participating in the transactions.

Allowing Canadian generic drug makers to ship to poorer countries would
provide the world a big source of cheap copies of brand name drugs and help
support the intent of the WTO deal, said Mr. Fried, who's in Cancun for the
WTO talks.

Mr. Fried said the Canadian government prides itself on standing up for
developing countries in international negotiations -- and assisting in
getting cheaper drugs to poor countries would be an ideal way of
demonstrating that.

"Canada always likes to paint itself as -- and often is -- a friend of
developing countries. Here is one concrete way that Canada can move forward
to make affordable medicines available to countries that need it," Mr.
Fried said.

Harvey Bale, director general of the International Federation of
Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Associations, which represents brand-name drug
makers around the world, said what Mr. Keon is proposing could set up a
slippery slope for eroding patent protection.

He said there's no need to start changing patent laws in places such as
Canada until it becomes clear what the demand is from the developing world
to meet health emergencies.
"To rush off and start changing patent laws before we have actually had an
experience with this ... [could mean] loose products floating around the
world," Mr. Bale said.

Brand-name drug makers say the price tag that accompanies patented drugs is
necessary to fund further research and development to invent new medicines.

Mr. Fried says the annual bill for treatments of one "cocktail" of patented
drugs to treat AIDS in wealthy countries can cost $10,000 (U.S.), while
India, which is a developing country, can produce a generic copy of those
drugs for $300 a year.

Brand-name drugs under patent protection can cost a lot more than generic
copies of those drugs. "These are eating up developing countries' budgets
all over the world," Mr. Fried said.

[end]


Richard Elliott
Associate Director, Policy & Research / Directeur, politiques et recherche
Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network / R=E9seau juridique canadien VIH/sida
890 Yonge Street, Suite 700, Toronto, Canada M4W 3P4
Tel : +1 (416) 595-1666 Fax +1 (416) 595-0094
E-mail: relliott@aidslaw.ca Web: www.aidslaw.ca

The Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network is a partner organisation of the
AIDS Law Project of South Africa, and a non-governmental organization in
Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the
United Nations. //
Le R=E9seau juridique canadien VIH/sida est un organisme partenaire du AIDS
Law Project
de l'Afrique du Sud et ONG dot=E9 de statut consultatif sp=E9cial aupr=E8s =
du
Conseil =E9conomique
et social des Nations Unies.

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