CHINA: Relief Group Says World Trade Organization Rules for Drug Patents Hurt AIDS Patients in China

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2005. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

CHINA: Relief Group Says World Trade Organization Rules for Drug Patents Hurt AIDS Patients in China

Associated Press (12.12.05) - Monday, December 12, 2005
Helen Luk

The World Trade Organization's intellectual property rules are preventing China from manufacturing its own generic HIV drugs, ultimately hurting Chinese AIDS patients, Doctors Without Borders said today. A recent WTO measure now under negotiation would make permanent a waiver that allows poor nations to import such drugs, but that would not help in China, said DWB. "There is a glaring lack of evidence that the measures proposed by the WTO would actually resolve the difficulties we are facing. Not even one patient has benefited from its use," said Ellen 't Hoen, DWB's director of access to essential medicines. "It seems that the WTO has decided to sacrifice access to medicines before the Hong Kong meeting, settling for inadequate measures simply to get it off the agenda." WTO members have until Dec. 1, 2007, to ratify the amendment.
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