[Ip-health] Reuters piece on Clinton supporting Thai and Brazilian CL decisions

[Thiru Balasubramaniam]

<SNIP>

"I strongly support the position of the governments of Thailand and
Brazil and their decision after futile negotiations to break these
patents," said Clinton.

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http://www.reuters.com/article/homepageCrisis/idUSN08193718._CH_.2400

Bill Clinton brokers deal for lower AIDS drug prices

Tue May 8, 2007 6:03PM EDT

(Updates with details from announcement)

By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK, May 8 (Reuters) - Former President Bill Clinton announced
deals with two Indian generic drug companies on Tuesday to cut prices
of AIDS treatments for 66 developing countries, a move that could help
nearly half a million patients.

The new prices for second line anti-retroviral drugs, which are
required by patients who develop resistance to a previous drug regimen,
will mean an average savings of 25 percent in low-income countries and
50 percent in middle-income countries, said Clinton, who announced the
deal at the Clinton Foundation offices in New York.

These drugs are about 10 times the price of first-line treatments, he
said, noting that nearly a half million patients will require these
drugs by 2010.

"That's a very great strain on countries' health-care budgets, and
governments fear all over the world that they will simply not be able
to keep patients on treatment," he said.

The pact between the Clinton Foundation and Indian companies Cipla Ltd.
and Matrix Laboratories Ltd. HIV/AIDS is widespread in many countries
in Africa and Southeast Asia.

The companies collaborated with the foundation to lower production
costs, in part by securing lower prices for key raw materials and by
addressing chemistry challenges, he said.

Clinton also said a new once-daily pill now prohibitively expensive in
developing countries would be made available for less than $1 a day. He
said the pill combines the drugs Tenofovir and Lamivudine and
Efavirenz.

"This drug represents the best chance that science has to offer," said
Clinton, who was joined by the health ministers of Thailand and Kenya,
the chairman of Matrix and France's ambassador to the United States.

The new cost for this treatment of $339 per patient per year marks a 45
percent reduction from the current rate available to low-income
countries and a 67 percent reduction from the price available to many
middle-income countries, the foundation said.

The announcement is one of several price reductions the Clinton
Foundation said its HIV/AIDS Initiative has helped broker since 2002.
Some 750,000 people are receiving drug treatments for AIDS through the
foundation, it said.

The AIDS virus infects nearly 39 million people globally, and has
killed 25 million people since it was identified 25 years ago.
Virtually all -- 95 percent -- of people infected with the virus live
in the developing world.

Clinton said he supported Brazil and Thailand's efforts to challenge
drug patents of big pharmaceutical companies.

Thailand this year issued licenses for cheap generic versions of Abbott
Laboratories Inc.'s (ABT.N: Quote, Profile, Research Kaletra for HIV,
and Brazil last week took a similar step with Merck & Co.'s (MRK.N:
Quote, Profile, Research Efavirenz.

"I strongly support the position of the governments of Thailand and
Brazil and their decision after futile negotiations to break these
patents," said Clinton.

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Thiru Balasubramaniam
Geneva Representative
Knowledge Ecology International (KEI)
voice +41.22.791.6727
fax +41.22.723.2988
mobile +41 76 508 0997
thiru@keionline.org