[Ip-health] Thailand: EU Complains Again About Affordable Medicine

[Michelle Childs]

The  EU Commission claims it supports the Doha declaration, its
actions show otherwise.  The seem to think if they don't take Thailand
to the WTO ( they can't because they would lose) then there is no
problem and diplomatic pressure some how doesn't count . They are
wrong. As Jill Johnstone points out

<SNIP>

> 'There is simply no way that Thailand will be able to honour its Doha
> pledge to implement its intellectual property laws in a manner
> consistent
> with access to medicine for all, if the U.S. and the European
> Commission
> exert pressure every time Thailand issues compulsory licenses,'


Michelle Childs
Head of European Affairs
Knowledge Ecology International
michelle.childs@cptech.org

"The world we have made, as a result of the level of thinking we have
done thus far, creates problems we cannot solve at the same level of
thinking at which we created them=94 Albert Einstein


---------
Michelle Childs
Head of European Affairs
Knowledge Ecology International
michelle.childs@keionline.org

"The world we have made, as a result of the level of thinking we have
done thus far, creates problems we cannot solve at the same level of
thinking at which we created them=94  Albert Einstein




>
>
>
> IPS (Latin America)
> HEALTH: EU Complains Again About Affordable Medicine
> March 20, 2008 Thursday
> BYLINE: David Cronin
>
> http://ipsnews.net/wap/news.asp?idnews=3D41653
>
> The European Union has made a fresh complaint to Thailand over
> policies
> aimed at guaranteeing that the poor are not deprived of vital
> medicines.
>
> Shortly before leaving office, former Thai health minister Mongkol Na
> Songkhla issued compulsory licences in January this year, overruling
> patents on four treatments for cancer. This was the latest in a
> series of
> decisions by the Bangkok government designed to bring down the
> prices of
> drugs that would otherwise be too expensive for a large section of the
> country's population.
>
> The EU's executive, the European Commission, has requested the newly
> installed government headed by Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, to
> reconsider the move.
>
> The EU's call comes despite its recognition that rules set by the
> World
> Trade Organisation do not forbid countries from giving measures deemed
> necessary to safeguard public health a higher priority than
> intellectual
> property rights asserted by pharmaceutical firms.
>
> 'The Commission has been in constant contact with the Thai
> authorities and
> has stressed that compulsory licensing, while allowed by WTO rules,
> should
> be regarded as a last resort option, and that negotiations and
> collaboration with pharmaceutical companies should be sought,' a
> Brussels-based trade official told IPS. 'The EU is hoping that this
> will be
> the line of the new government.' The official asked not to be named.
>
> Anti-poverty and consumer protection campaigners have voiced their
> unease
> at the Commission's call, which follows a similar appeal to Thailand
> in
> July 2007.
>
> At that time, EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson wrote to Bangkok
> to say
> he was concerned by reports that Thai authorities had decided on
> 'systematic use' of compulsory licensing in cases where they viewed
> the
> price of a patented drug as prohibitive. Such an approach would damage
> innovation in the pharmaceutical field, he contended.
>
> Ellen 't Hoen from the aid organisation M=E9decins Sans Fronti=E8res/
> Doctors
> Without Borders said she regarded the Commission's latest call on
> Thailand
> as 'quite shocking.' She said it is at variance with a declaration on
> public health approved by the WTO at a 2001 ministerial conference
> in Qatar
> capital Doha.
>
> 'In no shape or form does that Doha declaration talk about compulsory
> licensing having to be a last resort,' she added. 'Nor does it ask for
> prior negotiations with the pharmaceutical industry when a government
> decides to use compulsory licensing.'
>
> EU officials have said they do not have a problem with Thailand using
> compulsory licensing for AIDS treatment, as has been done over the
> past few
> years. Yet they have questioned how Thailand has also invoked such
> measures
> for heart disease and cancer treatments. Officials have privately
> queried
> if those diseases are so prevalent in Thailand that they constitute
> emergencies.
>
> 'T Hoen pointed out that there is nothing in the 2001 WTO declaration
> stipulating that it only applies to medicines for particular
> illnesses. 'It
> is not up to DG Trade (the Commission's trade division) to decide if a
> cancer patient in Thailand gets treatment or not.'
>
> Jill Johnstone from the National Consumer Council in Britain said
> the vast
> majority of Thais lived on just over five dollars a day in 2006.
> Before a
> compulsory license was issued last year for Plavix, which is
> prescribed for
> patients who have had heart attacks or strokes, the price of a
> recommended
> daily dose was two dollars, she noted, 'or nearly 40 percent of the
> average
> income of the bottom 80 percent of the population.
>
> 'There is simply no way that Thailand will be able to honour its Doha
> pledge to implement its intellectual property laws in a manner
> consistent
> with access to medicine for all, if the U.S. and the European
> Commission
> exert pressure every time Thailand issues compulsory licenses,' she
> added.
>
> Defenders of compulsory licensing suggest that it has been a useful
> tool in
> persuading drugs companies to reduce their prices.
>
> Among the treatments affected by January's announcement on cancer
> drugs was
> Imatinib, which is marketed under the brand name Glivec by the Swiss
> company Novartis. After the Thai authorities announced they were
> issuing a
> compulsory licence, Novartis offered this anti-leukaemia drug free of
> charge to the national health insurance programme. As a result the
> compulsory license for this drug was dropped, though three others for
> treatments manufactured by other companies were maintained.
>
> 'Poor people with cancer or heart disease cannot afford to buy very
> expensive drugs,' said a Thai diplomat. 'That is why our government
> has
> used compulsory licensing for drugs for poor people.
>
> 'My personal opinion is that I understand that when compulsory
> licensing is
> used, drugs companies cannot make a profit. On the other hand, there
> should
> be sympathy towards really poor people who will die if they don't have
> these drugs.'
>
> Despite the Commission's stance, it claims to have no intention of
> formally
> asking the WTO to investigate Thai policies. 'There has never been
> any talk
> of a WTO complaint on Thailand's compulsory licensing for
> medicines,' said
> an EU source.
>
>