[Ip-health] IP watch: WHO IP wprking Group consultation 1-15th November

[Michelle Childs]

http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/index.php?p=3D435&res=3D1024&print=3D0
27/10/2006
WHO Online Consultations On IP Working Group Begin Next Week


Newsposted by Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen @ 1:07 pm

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[Editor=92s Note: This story was modified shortly after publication to
reflect the WHO reply on meeting participation.]
By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen
The World Health Organization (WHO) has set the dates for online
consultations on the working group on public health, innovation and
intellectual property from 1 to 15 November, it said today.

=93WHO encourages individuals, civil society groups, government
institutions, academic and research institutions, the private sector and
other interested parties to contribute to the open hearings between 1 and
15 November,=94 the WHO said in a press release.

During this time it will be possible to give one=92s opinion about the WHO
inter-governmental working group that was mandated by the World Health
Assembly in May (IPW, Public Health, 2 October 2006).

Its mandate is to come up with a =93global strategy=94 and =93plan of actio=
n=94
for how research and development into medicines for diseases
=93predominantly affecting poor populations=94 may be improved, the WHO sai=
d.

A website has been set up for the consultation, through which
contributions may be submitted in any of the six official languages of the
United Nations, the WHO said. These are Arabic, Chinese, English, French,
Russian and Spanish.

The website is: http://igwg.who.int/phi/. It also will be possible to fax
contributions to the WHO at: +41 22 791 48 89. =93Contributors are
encouraged to provide a summary of their comments, which must not exceed
500 words,=94 the press release said.

The contributions will be compiled and reflected in a document to be
forwarded to the first official meeting of the working group, which is
scheduled for 4-8 December, the WHO said. This means that the secretariat
will have little more than two weeks to prepare the document and translate
it into the six languages required.

Who Will Be Let In?

The 4-8 December meeting of the intergovernmental working group (IWG),
which will be held in Geneva, will attract government officials but
according to the resolution from the Health Assembly, the WHO also will
invite:

=93 =85 as observers at the sessions of the intergovernmental working group=
,
representatives of non-member states, of liberation movements =85, of
organisations of the United Nations system, of intergovernmental
organisations with which WHO has established effective relations, and of
nongovernmental organizations in official relations with WHO.=94

The resolution also states that =93experts and a limited number of concerne=
d
public and private entities,=94 will also be invited to attend.

Some nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) that do not have =93official
relations with WHO=94 have expressed concern that they might not be able to
attend the December meeting, pointing to the fact that it is
time-consuming and difficult to obtain such a status, sources said.

In the lead-up to the December meeting, the European Union was to meet to
discuss the issue, a source said.

WHO clarifies meeting participation

WHO spokesperson Daniela Bagozzi said:
=93The web-based public hearings are a tool NGOs not in official relations
with WHO can use to provide input into the process. It is expected that
the sessions of the IWG, unless otherwise decided by the IWG, will take
place in public. Individuals or organisations wishing to follow the
debates may do so from the public gallery. Public badges can be requested
from the registration desk to be set up at the International Conference
Centre Geneva (ICCG) (17 rue de Varemb=E9, Geneva, Switzerland). Badges wil=
l
be issued on a daily basis.

The documents prepared for the IWG will, when they become available, be
posted on the WHO website: http://www.who.int/. From the homepage, scroll
down to the box headed =93Governance", click on the link and thereafter
follow the relevant link for the documentation. During the session there
will be a documents service at the ICCG and members of the public holding
a badge may request relevant documents.

Alternatively when NGOs are members of, or have a close link with, one of
the invited NGOs, they may wish to contact the NGO to explore the
possibility of being a member of the NGO=92s delegation to the IWG.=94

Tove Gerhardsen may be reached at tgerhardsen@ip-watch.ch.


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