[Ip-health] IP-Watch: Medicines Access Again Captures Attention At WTO As Progress In Round Urged

[Thiru Balasubramaniam]

<SNIP>

The US initially opposed informal consultations, an Indian delegate
told Intellectual Property Watch, suggesting that the number of times
a compulsory license has been used is not indication of success, and
suggesting also that the donations of medicines to developing
countries pre-empted the need for the system. They did in the end
agree to have one meeting, so long as it is discussions only and with
no report, the delegate added.


http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2009/10/30/medicines-access-again-captures-a=
ttention-at-wto-as-progress-in-round-urged/

30 October 2009
Medicines Access Again Captures Attention At WTO As Progress In Round
Urged
By Kaitlin Mara @ 12:52 pm

Access to medicine and preservation of biodiversity topped the agenda
at the World Trade Organization Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual
Property Rights Council meeting this week, as a new alleged drug
seizure in France, a concern over a largely-unused amendment to TRIPS
intended to help developing countries gain access to medicine, and a
renewed mandate on biodiversity at the World Intellectual Property
Organization influenced the issues on the table.

<SNIP>

Industry representatives from the US Chamber of Commerce and the
National Foreign Trade Council have been meeting with high-level
negotiators and secretariat members in Geneva on the past weeks to
encourage a completion of the Doha round.

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The next WTO ministerial meeting, at which a conclusion to the round
is explicitly not expected, is from 30 November to 2 December.

A Question of What IP Is and Should Be

A shipment of generic drugs allegedly stopped in a Parisian airport on
grounds of patent violation reignited Wednesday a debate over
medicines in transit that has been simmering since the beginning of
the year. The medicines - 1.74 million tablets of an antiplatelet
drug, used to treat patients at risk of strokes and heart attacks due
to blood clots - were en route to Venezuela from Mumbai when stopped.
India said it received a letter from French customs authorities about
the seizure.

<SNIP>

European delegates at the time said the regulation - EC 1383/2003 -
was intended to guard against dangerous drugs, and in an explanatory
note [pdf] from 31 July quote the European Federation of
Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations saying it is not the policy
of their members to =93use the powers of detention =85 to prevent the flow
of legitimate generics.=94

But India said Wednesday in a statement =93we see no guarantee that
there will be no seizures of generic drug consignments in the future
as long as Regulation 1383/2003 [which allows customs agents to stop
goods suspected of any IP infringement, not just trademark
infringement] exists in its present form.=94

At issue is the question of differing perceptions on what intellectual
property is and should be, the delegation of China said in the TRIPS
Council meeting Wednesday, one source told Intellectual Property
Watch. For some, the source said, the stopped shipments are merely a
trade issue, but for others it is an issue of access to medicines.

=93Underlying the drug seizures is also a deliberate mixing up of the
issue of spurious/sub-standard drugs =85 with IPRs,=94 said the statement
of India made during the Council meeting. The conflation of
counterfeit (seen as an IP matter) with sub-standard medicines (seen
as a drug regulatory issue) and also with legitimate generic medicines
has been an area of concern for many developing countries, both at the
WTO and within the World Health Organization (IPW, WHO, 27 January
2009).


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Expeditious Solution to Medicines Access Proves Not So

A 2005 amendment to TRIPS intended to aid developing countries lacking
medicine manufacturing capacity is widely perceived as not living up
to expectations, with only one use since its inception in 2003 - by a
company that has vowed never to use the system again (IPW, IP Burble,
17 September 2009). The amendment allows the export of the majority of
medicines produced under compulsory licence.

This =93=91expeditious solution=92 to the crisis in access to medicines =85
has been far from expeditious,=94 said a statement of India made 27
October, which then called for informal consultations with interested
members to increase the system=92s efficacy.

The African Group also made a statement about the inefficacy of the
system, as did the Least Developed Countries group, according to
sources.

The US initially opposed informal consultations, an Indian delegate
told Intellectual Property Watch, suggesting that the number of times
a compulsory license has been used is not indication of success, and
suggesting also that the donations of medicines to developing
countries pre-empted the need for the system. They did in the end
agree to have one meeting, so long as it is discussions only and with
no report, the delegate added.

=93We look forward to participating in such discussions,=94 the US told
Intellectual Property Watch, adding =93we wanted to make sure that the
decision to consult did not presuppose any particular conclusion to
the discussion.=94

<SNIP>


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Thiru Balasubramaniam
Geneva Representative
Knowledge Ecology International (KEI)
thiru@keionline.org


Tel: +41 22 791 6727
Mobile: +41 76 508 0997