[Ip-health] (no subject)

[Rachel Belt]

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[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
The film Battle in Seattle, about the 1999 WTO meeting brings trade issues
including those related Access to Medicines, Labor and Environment to a
broader audience. The film will be showing for a limited time (next 3 weeks
from Friday September 19 to October 16) and if there is interest may lead t=
o
wider distribution.

For screening times and locations see:
http://www.battleinseattlemovie.com/tickets/

"Battle in Seattle": Film Reenacts Access to Medicines and Trade Advocacy
Effort at WTO

Battle in Seattle opened in New York starting this Friday, September 19.
With a cast including Charlize Theron, Woody Harrelson and Ray Liotta, the
film is a fictionalized account of the protests surrounding the 1999 WTO
meeting. Among the actions it depicts are those of Dr. Bernard P=E9coul, th=
en
director of MSF's Access to Essential Medicines Campaign, who urged the WTO
to ensure that trade of essential medicines is regulated in the interest of
public health.

"Why are we, a medical humanitarian agency, here in Seattle at the start of
the WTO ministerial meeting on trade?" P=E9coul asked in an address to the
official WTO symposium on non-governmental organizations. "Because our
patients are dying. They are dying because of lack of access to lifesaving
medicines and the lack of research and development for neglected diseases.
Lifesaving medicines are available but they are simply too expensive, due i=
n
large part to patent protection. Our patients are dying, not because their
diseases are incurable, but because as consumers, they do not provide a
viable market for pharmaceutical products."

Although progress has been made to reduce the price of first-line AIDS and
other essential medicines, the global system of drug research and
development remains fundamentally flawed. Between 1975 and 2004, 1,556 new
chemical entities were marketed globally. Only 20 of these =96 a mere 1.3 p=
er
cent =96 were for tropical diseases and tuberculosis, which account for 12
percent of the total disease burden. This 1 percent ratio has been steady
over the last three decades.

For more information visit:

MSF's Access to Essential Medicines Campaign see
http://www.accessmed-msf.org/

Battle in Seattle see http://www.battleinseattlemovie.com