Copyright 1999 The Chronicle Publishing Co.
The San
Francisco Chronicle
DECEMBER 3, 1999, FRIDAY, FINAL EDITION
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A20
LENGTH: 836 words
HEADLINE:
Poor Nations Given Hope on AIDS Drugs;
New policy would
lower prices
BYLINE: Sabin Russell, Chronicle Staff
Writer
BODY:
Sensing a major shift in U.S. trade
policy, supporters of the effort to bring AIDS drugs cheaply to
poor countries hit hard by the epidemic are exultant over remarks by President
Clinton that appear to embrace their cause.
In a speech Wednesday to
World Trade Organization ministers at their protest-racked conference in
Seattle, Clinton announced that the United States will seek "flexibility" in the
enforcement of drug patent laws when countries face a public health crisis.
"The United States will henceforward implement its health care and trade
policies in a manner that ensures that people in the poorest countries won't
have to go without medicine they so desperately need," the president told the
ministers.
In that seemingly simple statement lies a dramatic change in
the U.S. stance toward drug company patent protection. As late as May, U.S.
Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky had argued before the World Health
Organization that administration policy was to seek stronger protections for
American drug patents than current WTO rules allow.
"For us, it's
incredible. We are really pleased. All of the activism has paid off," said
Daniel Berman, director of the Access to Essential Medicines Project of the
French medical group Doctors Without Borders.
The organization, which
this year won the Nobel Peace Prize, has played a leading role in bringing to
global attention the issue of increased access to drug treatment regimens.
The new policy, as explained in a White House press briefing, requires
that American trade negotiators consult with the Department of Health and Human
Services when patent issues conflict with a trading partner's public health
concerns.
In cases where public health is at risk, the U.S. policy would
no longer challenge the use of two tools -- permitted under WTO rules -- that
activists say can help make Western medicines cheaper for impoverished
countries.
By one approach, a country can use "compulsory
licensing" to force a drug company to license its patent to a local
manufacturer. The second method, "parallel importing," allows a country to shop
the world market for the lowest drug prices rather than be forced to accept
those set by the companies that developed the drug.
"The immediate
effect of this is that poor countries can at least try to use compulsory
licensing and parallel importing and not fear retribution from the
U.S.," Berman said.
Doctors Without Borders lists 42 nations where the
United States has lodged drug patent complaints. Berman said the organization
will continue to monitor those disputes to determine how the government backs up
Clinton's words with action.
On Wednesday, Barshefsky and Health and
Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala announced jointly that the United States
was taking South Africa off its "Watch List," a diplomatic way
of declaring that the country is no longer in the doghouse for policies
challenging drug patents.
The basis for the new policy was laid this
summer, when Vice President Al Gore was badgered at campaign stops by protesters
who accused him of placing drug company interests ahead of the needs of
AIDS patients in Africa, where two-thirds of
the 33.6 million people infected with the AIDS virus reside.
In September, the Clinton administration lifted a threat of trade
sanctions against South Africa, and pharmaceutical companies
suspended a lawsuit challenging a law that would have permitted
compulsory licensing of life-saving drugs. This week's action
by the president appears to broaden that policy to all developing nations, and
it is not restricted to medications for AIDS.
The same
rules that could cut prices for AIDS drugs might also bring
down prices for antibiotics that fight tuberculosis, or anti-fungal drugs that
treat a variety of life-threatening infections.
"This is an affirmation
that the special policy for South Africa would be general
policy throughout the world," said Jamie Love, director of the Consumer Project
on Technology, a Ralph Nader-led organization that first promoted the idea of
using compulsory licensing for AIDS drugs.
Love said he has some doubts about how well the administration will
follow through on its policy. He noted that only last month, Washington was
pressuring the legislature in the Dominican Republic not to pass a law
permitting compulsory licensing.
Another crucial issue
for those seeking broader access to AIDS drugs will be to win a
ruling by the WTO ensuring that poor countries that cannot afford to make their
own medicines will be able to import from other nations that produce them
cheaply under compulsory licenses.
Such a step will be fiercely resisted
by international pharmaceutical companies.
Mark Grayson, a spokesman for
the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said before the
conference that WTO rules forbid imports of drugs produced under compulsory
licenses. "If AIDS drugs get compulsory licensed around the
world, it will dampen research," he said.
LOAD-DATE: December 3, 1999
