[Ip-health] New Indian law is a threat to Ugandan healthcare consumers

[Serutoke, Mr. Joseph - ug]

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A consumer perspective that appeared in the Uganda Press on the
implications of India's new Patent Law.

Joseph Serutoke
Pharmacist
Uganda

Consumer Perspectives:
By Shaban Serunkuma
Feb 15, 2005


Millions of healthcare consumers worldwide, including Ugandans, could
soon taste the bitter pill of contemporary globalisation when recent
policy and legislative action in India, particularly with regard to the
country's pharmaceuticals industry, take effect.

To comply with the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
or TRIPS Agreement of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the government
of India on December 26, 2004 promulgated the Patent (Amendment)
Ordinance rendering obsolete the non-compliant Indian Patents Act of
1970.

The move left many poor developing countries holding their breath. Not
because of the act of passage of the law, but provisions therein that
had ramifications beyond the vast Asian country, home to over 1 billion
people.

Under the 10-year-old TRIPS Agreement, all member states to the WTO must
enact laws to safeguard inventions (intellectual property) or patents.
In simple terms, member states must, through legislation, ensure that
knowledge related to new inventions (e.g. drugs) and related
technologies is safeguarded from use by unauthorised parties for
commercial or other gains.

For instance, TRIPS compels WTO member states to enact laws to make it
illegal and punishable for one (including governments even under
emergencies) to obtain the formula for making a patented (protected)
drug without express permission from the inventor, owner of intellectual
property rights or relevant competent authority.

Ideally, this would enable innovators to enjoy rewards accruing from
application of their knowledge to solve problems and for use in
industrial processes. Failure to comply exposes errant parties to
potentially crippling trade sanctions.
The multibillion-dollar Indian pharmaceuticals industry that is mainly
buoyed by generic (copies of patented or once-patented) products,
supplies medicines to over 150 countries worldwide.

It is widely known that many pharmaceutical manufacturers in the
populous Asian country make generic versions of patented products
without permission from patent owners.
Under the new regime, they have to either close shop or, in the event
that the owners agree, pay for use of the inventions. Uganda and India
are member sates of the WTO.

Close to two months later, sporadic outbreak of anger over the Indian
government's decision has crystallised into a global coalition armed
with an arsenal of research, millions of people ready to picket and
growing concern among consumers. The coalition is a civil society
effort.
Saturday February 26, was elected as the Global Day of Action against
the Indian Patent Ordinance.

In civil society parlance, it simply means the usual package of
hardnosed campaigns, complete with strong media action, demonstrations
and behind-the-scenes high-level advocacy. Fair trade activists contend
that provisions in the new law are aimed at appeasing western
pharmaceutical interests at the expense of the lives of the poor
healthcare consumers.

They argue that the new law threatens to choke off the badly needed
supplies, by either indirectly notching up their prices or halting
production. This would put some essential medicines out of reach of the
generally poor healthcare consumers in the affected countries. It
includes the hitherto affordable and life-supporting Anti-Retroviral
(ARV) drugs for treatment of HIV/Aids.

UNAIDS estimates that 40 million people are living with HIV worldwide,
of which 6 million are in immediate need of anti-retroviral treatment.
Figures for India and Uganda indicate that more than 5 million people
(an estimated 1.5 million in Uganda) are living with HIV and 0.5 million
(0.12m in Uganda) of these need immediate treatment.

Some 8,500 people die of AIDS worldwide everyday due to lack of access
to treatment. Developments in India, therefore, would be seen as a
macabre mockery of multilateral efforts to preserve life and health, if
left unchecked.

And from India, battle over patent law could soon come to Uganda. Local
activists are worried about the commitment of government in ensuring
that the proposed draft Patent Bill is fair and would not impinge on
people's access to essential medicines. And they could be justified.

A reliable source told me recently that the bill, earlier discussed with
various stakeholders, has not been presented to Cabinet. But worse, the
draft is not even listed on the 2004/05 legislative agenda of
Parliament. Given that Uganda has up to December this year to enact a
TRIPS compliant patent law, local activists headed by the Uganda
Coalition for Access to Essential Medicines are anxious.

Members of the coalition are of the view that government would easily,
with a few months left, hurriedly pass the draft law with its
inadequacies.
The development in India completes a double-edged-sword-challenge to the
country that recently awoke with the spectre of increased cost of
pharmaceuticals under the new East African Community Customs Union.

Complaints have emerged that under the common tariff regime prices of
pharmaceutical imports to Uganda could spiral upwards, unless timely
interventions are made.

(c) 2005 The Monitor Publications.



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