Roche Will Not Enforce Patents on Antiretroviral Drugs in
"Least-Developed" Countries
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Pharmaceutical company Roche on Wednesday announced it will no
longer file patents for antiretroviral drugs and drugs to treat
other diseases or enforce existing patents on those drugs in
countries that the United Nations has designated as "least de-
veloped," Dow Jones News reports (Dow Jones News, 3/31).
In addition, Roche said it will not file patent applications for
any new antiretroviral drugs in sub-Saharan Africa and will not
take legal action against generic drug manufacturers in the re-
gion that produce versions of drugs for which Roche owns the
patent, according to a Roche release. Roche also said it has
adopted a not-for-profit approach to selling its protease in-
hibitors in least-developed countries.
According to the release, Roche said that such moves "under-
score[e] its belief that long-term success requires businesses
to operate in ways that are not only economically, but also so-
cially and environmentally sustainable."
Roche Will Not Enforce Patents... (2)
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Dear all, dear 'Roche',
I am running an STI programme in Mozambique, which is on the
list of least developed countries.
If Roche is truly concerned about the epidemic, they also should
lower their prices for tests for STI, like PCR for Chlamydia and
Gonorrhea etc... Everybody knows that STI are fuelling the
spread of HIV, So lowering the prices for STI-testing should be
on the agenda as well.
Especially in Sub-Saharan Africa:
Roche South Africa gave me a quotation with ridiculously high
prices for their PCR kits. Prices were 4 TIMES HIGHER then
prices in Europe!!! Can anybody understand this international
policy? I do not see the "socially and environmentally sustain-
able" way of operating here, I'm sorry. ASKING HIGHER PRICES IN
AFRICA THAN IN EUROPE???
So I felt obliged to buy in Europe and import with cooled trans-
port to Mozambique. Even with transport costs, prices per test
were much, much lower. I asked several times for an explanation
but until now I didn't get a response from Roche. I will try it
this way.
Kind regards,
Dr. Wouter Arrazola de Onate, MD
International Centre for Reproductive Health
Field Coordinator Mozambique
Universidade Eduardo Mondlane - Universidade da Ghent
Faculdade de Medicina
Av. Salvador Allende
Maputo, Mozambique
Cellular: +258-82-768-235
mailto:wouter@health.uem.mz