Big Pharma’s Free Ride

Pharmaceutical companies are using free-trade deals like CAFTA to eliminate global competition – and deny poor patients access to cheaper generic drugs.

    In November 2004, Guatemala’s Congress repealed a law that gave brand-name prescription drugs protection from generic competition. The law had allowed brand-name companies to conceal data that generic companies would use to bring their own versions to market, and public health activists hailed the move as a step toward greater access to essential medicines. But four months later, legislators reversed themselves and put those protections back in place. The protests that followed led to many injuries and one death. Why did this small nation, where cheap generic drugs have been key to treating one of Latin America’s largest HIV-positive populations, change course?

    In a word: CAFTA. Guatemala changed its laws in order to become part of the Central American Free Trade Agreement, which encompasses five Central American countries and the Dominican Republic. CAFTA, which President Bush signed last week after coaxing it through Congress, requires its members to adopt strict rules on intellectual property rights, including those protecting prescription drugs. These drugs cost up to 22 times what Doctors Without Borders, which runs several AIDS clinics in Guatemala, pays for generic equivalents. Some economists say similarly high drug costs would cause the unique universal healthcare system of nearby Costa Rica to collapse.

    And the Bush administration continues to present two faces, claiming it supports global health and investing in the battle against AIDS in the developing world while pushing trade deals that undermine the same principles.

For the full article go to http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/081205HA.shtml.