A global trade deal cutting the price of vital medicines has been welcomed by the world’s big drug makers for the patent safeguards it offers. The agreement has given a much-needed boost to troubled negotiations on freeing up global trade just days before a crucial summit.
A deal on medicines is a key part of the World Trade Organisation's (WTO) Doha Round of trade talks, and negotiators were racing to strike a deal before ministers meet to review the round's progress in Cancun, Mexico, next week.
The round, whose success is seen as vital to boosting the world economy, has missed a series of past deadlines for accords, including on the drugs issue and agriculture, and a further failure would have been a severe blow, envoys said.
For the $400 billion-a-year pharmaceutical industry, these checks should stop copycat drugs made in the Third World flooding premium Western markets.
But health activists said the safeguards in the World Trade Organisation deal signed over the weekend added such a mound of red tape and conditions that drug prices would not sink as low as they should in countries where AIDS and malaria ravage the population.
Companies that invent such drugs argue that without such a patent, or 20-year monopoly, to protect profits, no one would invest to research such medicines in the first place.
Mr Harvey Bale, director general of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Associations, welcomed the deal on Saturday.
Under the WTO pact, poor states with no drug industry will be able to buy cheap generic, or copycat drugs from countries such as India or Brazil to combat health crises. They must, however, ensure none of these products end up on Western markets where patents are strictly enforced, and only buy drugs that save lives – not "lifestyle" drugs such as the anti-impotence Viagra. The drugs must also not be used for commercial gain.
Under current trade rule exemptions, poor countries can make vital cheap generic drugs for domestic use, but not import them.
The United States, home to many major pharmaceutical firms, had resisted an earlier draft accord and insisted on tighter conditions to protect the patent owners.
Analysts said the final agreement was good for big research-based firms in several ways.
It should improve their public image after damaging rows, including a legal battle with South Africa, which has the world's biggest AIDS crisis, over intellectual property. In addition, the markets involved are insignificant to them and the deal will have minimal financial impact.
-(Reuters)
