Africa vs. Big Pharm

Poor Nations Can Purchase Cheap Drugs Under Accord (NY Times) covers a recent accord passed by the WTO allowing poorer nations, particularly African ones, to purchase generic versions of needed drugs from non-approved vendors.

“Under the accord, poor countries will be able to import generic versions of expensive patented medicines, buying them from countries like India and Brazil without running afoul of trade laws protecting patent rights.”

You may recall a similar accord being tabled last year, but rejected by one ‘nay’ vote: that of the US, claiming that US pharmaceutical interests would be harmed if Africans were allowed access to life-saving drugs without paying for them. This was covered in Proud of your country? (earthli News) last December. However, now “[t]he breakthrough came earlier this week when the United States agreed to the original proposal it had rejected last December.” That was the move followed only weeks later by Bush’s State of the Union address, in which he pledged USD $12 million to Africa to fight their various epidemics. That may sound like a tremendous amount of money to a taxpayer who’s still plunking down USD $4 billion per month for the occupation of Iraq, but I assure you it’s not that much.

So the relaxing of patent rules may sound like overwhelmingly good news, albeit somewhat hard to believe that the US has made a move so against previous and existing policies (particularly the extreme stances of the Bush administration). If you only read the first few paragraphs here, you’ll be left with the distinct impression that the US has led the charge in helping Africa; that Africa will now have easy access to drugs that will save millions of lives per year without risk of international lawsuit.

If you bother to read further, and I’m betting the editors of the Times assume you won’t, you’ll find that:

“This week the United States accepted the original proposal, but included the demand that such generic medicines could be imported to cure any life-threatening disease, so long as it was a public health emergency.”

This is where the publishing of the Times is not only suspicious, but criminally negligent. Since the article is so obviously divided into two entirely separate themes (the first being “Africa is saved” and the second being “Not really”), it can only be the intention to give ‘browsing’ readers the impression that something really good happened, without lying, since the information is freely available in the remainder of the article, which no one really reads.

So, in fact, the US did not sign the original agreement. They only signed it after altering it so “that countries would not take advantage of it and reap commercial profits rather than meet public health needs.” This, on the surface, makes sense. However, the end result will, of course, be to “[doom] the accord by encasing it with enough bureaucratic red tape to discourage poor nations from importing the drugs.”

The way to tell that Africa really has won nothing here is look at the other claimant: Big Pharm. It’s like when you barter in a country that likes bartering: if the other guy is still smiling, then you got screwed.

“The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America issued a statement today praising the agreement, saying “now that this issue has been resolved, governments and the public health community can concentrate on the immense practical problems of delivering needed medicines to patients in the world’s poorest countries.””

Sounds a lot like Africa got screwed.