[Ip-health] Reports: Thailand to proceed with cancer CLs

[robert weissman]

There is more amiguity in these reports than is initially obvious. The
coming days will make clearer what this means.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2008/03/11/headlines/headlines_30067790.php
The Nation (Thailand)
DRUG POLICY
Cancer patients' lifeline
Chaiya backs down on licensing

Published on March 11, 2008

The Public Health Ministry will push ahead with compulsory licensing for
cancer drugs, arguing the country could save up to Bt3 billion over five
years.

"The standpoint of the Public Health Ministry is to protect the benefits
of patients, not of business," Minister Chaiya Sasomsap said yesterday.

He was forced to reverse his initial policy, stated on his first day in
office, that he would end compulsory licensing for cancer drugs,
following political pressure for him to stick to the policy of the
previous government.

He said he had talked with Commerce Minister Ming-kwan Sangsuwan to seek
a solution to the controversial issue.

The Commerce Ministry will now have to negotiate with drug firms on pricing.

"I think it is over for us here. If the Commerce Ministry goes against
this imposition of compulsory licensing for fear of hurting Thailand's
international trade, then it is their duty to come up with other
protection," Chaiya said.

His predecessor, Dr Mongkol Na Songkla, on January 4 levied compulsory
licensing on foreign drugs to treat breast and lung cancer. They are
docetaxel, sold as Taxotere by Sanofi Aventis; erlotinib, sold as
Tarceva by Roche; and letrozole, sold as Femara by Novartis.

When Chaiya took over the ministry, he suddenly ordered health officials
to revise this policy to override drug patents. He cited a confidential
letter from the Commerce Ministry expressing concern that Thailand would
be designated as a priority foreign country for abusing intellectual
property rights and breaking patents on US products.

But the National Cancer Institute of Thailand and the Network of
Patients Suffering from Cancer reported that Thailand could save Bt3
billion over five years by using generic versions of the three cancer drugs.

The National Cancer Institute and others estimate there will be 12,000
new breast-cancer cases this year and 14,400 new cases in 2012.

Pongphon Sarnsamak

--

http://www.guardian.co.uk/feedarticle?id=7372278
Thailand will override cancer drug patents

  BANGKOK, March 10 (Reuters) - Thailand's new government will override
international patents on three cancer drugs, new Health Minister Chaiya
Sasomsap said on Monday after a month of protests against his review of
the controversial policy.

Chaiya, under pressure from health activists and doctors who campaigned
to have him sacked, said declaring compulsory licences on the drugs
would save Thailand more than 3 billion baht ($100 million) over the
next five years.

"The findings have convinced me to go ahead with the CLs since the
ministry's policy is to give patients good access to quality drugs at
cheap prices," Chaiya said of the review by a panel of Health Ministry
officials.

The decision is a blow to major pharmaceutical companies which had
lobbied hard to reverse the CL policy launched by the previous
government appointed after a bloodless 2006 coup.

The three drugs are Letrozole, a breast cancer medicine made by Novartis
AG, the breast and lung cancer drug Docetaxel by Sanofi-Aventis, and
Roche's Erlotinib, used for treating lung, pancreatic and ovarian cancer.

Shortly after a democratically-elected government took power in
February, Chaiya ordered the review of a policy he said was a
"politically correct decision, but not legally correct".

At the time he said the government could afford the full cost of the
drugs, if it meant avoiding trade retaliation by the United States, home
to some of the world's biggest drug firms.

U.S. officials denied there were any plans to impose sanctions on
Bangkok, although Thailand was placed on a watch list, meaning
Washington believed its respect for patents had weakened.

When Chaiya, a businessman with no medical training, fired the Health
Ministry's top official negotiating cheaper prices from foreign drug
firms, outraged health activists and doctors launched a campaign to
remove him.

Chaiya said on Monday the ministry would buy cheaper versions of the
cancer drugs from generic producers, such as Indian firms which already
supply copy-cat HIV-AIDS medicines to Thailand.

Under World Trade Organisation rules, countries can issue a compulsory
licence to make or buy generic versions of patented drugs deemed
critical to public health as long as the medicines are meant for
domestic use.

Former Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla overrode Merck's AIDS drug
Efavirenz in late 2006, arguing that Thailand could not afford patented
drugs for a national health plan that covers about 80 percent of the
country's 63 million people.

A few months later he did the same on a Sanofi-Aventis heart medicine
and an AIDS drug made by Abbott Laboratories, which refused to register
several new medicines in Thailand.

Mongkol, who targeted the four cancer drugs weeks before he left office,
has defended the CL policy against major drug firms which accused him of
stealing their intellectual property rights. ($1= 30 Baht) (Reporting by
Nopporn Wong-Anan; Editing by Darren Schuettler)