SunWuKong
09-11-2003, 11:32 PM
i hate drug companies.
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Drug wars: The US strikes back
By Indrajit Basu
KOLKATA - It is starting to look as if once again US pharmaceutical manufacturers have outmaneuvered developing-world drug makers, despite the agreement last month that will allow poorer nations to import cheap generics to beat major killers such as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and malaria.
In an agreement which World Trade Organization Director General Supachai Panitchpakdi described as historic, all 146 members of the trade body on August 30 rubber-stamped a deal between the United States and a key group of developing countries – Brazil, India, South Africa and Kenya - to allow poorer nations to import cheap unbranded and off-patent pharmaceuticals. The agreement, for instance, will allow the West African country Burkina Faso, with more than 440,000 of its 11.5 million population living with AIDS/HIV, to import anti-AIDS drugs from India at one-fifth their present import cost.
The US removed its bitter opposition to the agreement after repeating for two years US pharmaceutical industry complaints that generic drug companies in developing countries, such as Brazil and India, could start copying patented medicines - like Viagra - and divert such cheap copies to developed markets like the US and European Union.
However, Indian drug makers are scarcely delighted with the US's changed stance. Even though global organizations, including the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association of America, called the compromise "significant, and a bonanza for India and Brazil", the Indians allege that while the US has finally agreed to the settlement, its pharmaceutical majors are increasingly adopting strategies that go against the basic tenet of the WTO: relaxing barriers for free global trade.
"The US may have allowed drug makers in the developing countries to sell generic versions of expensive medicines to poorer nations," said a member of the Indian Pharmaceuticals Alliance, a powerful drug manufacturers' lobby, "but the US market itself is getting increasingly tough as a result of strategies that a few large US drug makers have started adopting lately."
According to the industry, even as Indian generic drug makers are finalizing their strategies to enter the US - the world's biggest pharmaceutical market - in January 2005, major US pharmaceutical companies are converting their patented prescription drugs to over-the-counter (OTC)products, just as their patents expire, as a ploy to give them three years more protection from competition, foreign or otherwise.
more... (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EI12Df05.html)
------------------------------------
Drug wars: The US strikes back
By Indrajit Basu
KOLKATA - It is starting to look as if once again US pharmaceutical manufacturers have outmaneuvered developing-world drug makers, despite the agreement last month that will allow poorer nations to import cheap generics to beat major killers such as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and malaria.
In an agreement which World Trade Organization Director General Supachai Panitchpakdi described as historic, all 146 members of the trade body on August 30 rubber-stamped a deal between the United States and a key group of developing countries – Brazil, India, South Africa and Kenya - to allow poorer nations to import cheap unbranded and off-patent pharmaceuticals. The agreement, for instance, will allow the West African country Burkina Faso, with more than 440,000 of its 11.5 million population living with AIDS/HIV, to import anti-AIDS drugs from India at one-fifth their present import cost.
The US removed its bitter opposition to the agreement after repeating for two years US pharmaceutical industry complaints that generic drug companies in developing countries, such as Brazil and India, could start copying patented medicines - like Viagra - and divert such cheap copies to developed markets like the US and European Union.
However, Indian drug makers are scarcely delighted with the US's changed stance. Even though global organizations, including the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association of America, called the compromise "significant, and a bonanza for India and Brazil", the Indians allege that while the US has finally agreed to the settlement, its pharmaceutical majors are increasingly adopting strategies that go against the basic tenet of the WTO: relaxing barriers for free global trade.
"The US may have allowed drug makers in the developing countries to sell generic versions of expensive medicines to poorer nations," said a member of the Indian Pharmaceuticals Alliance, a powerful drug manufacturers' lobby, "but the US market itself is getting increasingly tough as a result of strategies that a few large US drug makers have started adopting lately."
According to the industry, even as Indian generic drug makers are finalizing their strategies to enter the US - the world's biggest pharmaceutical market - in January 2005, major US pharmaceutical companies are converting their patented prescription drugs to over-the-counter (OTC)products, just as their patents expire, as a ploy to give them three years more protection from competition, foreign or otherwise.
more... (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EI12Df05.html)