E-DRUG: GlaxoSmithKline: Drug giants aren't the problem
�-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[GSK responds in the UK Guardian on the OXFAM report.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4135896,00.html
Copied as fair use. NN]
Glaxo SmithKline's chief executive responds to the Guardian's series
Jean-Pierre Garnier
Wednesday February 14, 2001
The Guardian
No bigger challenge faces the world than the need to improve access to healthcare in developing countries. Oxfam's report this week correctly identifies deep-seated barriers to the developing world's access to medicines: "Household poverty, inadequate public spending, and weak public-health infrastructures combine to place effective treatment beyond the means of the poor."
Yet the report does not focus on these real and fundamental problems. Instead, predictably and frustratingly, it chose to focus on the protection of intellectual property, demonising the research-based pharmaceutical industry in the process.
Oxfam quotes the World Health Organisation's estimate that 2bn people in developing countries lack access to vital medicines. Yet this crisis has nothing to do with patent protection. Fewer than 5% of the medicines on WHO's essential drugs list are covered by patent protection anywhere in the world, let alone in developing countries, many of which have no effective intellectual property laws.
Oxfam set great store by the ability of generic pharmaceutical production to solve the problem. Yet millions are dying every year in developing countries because they cannot afford or obtain low cost generic treatments for malaria, TB and other common diseases.
This is not the result of patent protection, but of the very factors identified by Oxfam themselves - poverty and the absence of effective health systems.
Oxfam's proposal to weaken patent protection would do nothing to alter this situation, but could have dangerous consequences. As Oxfam points out: "Public health in industrialised countries is being transformed by breathtaking medical advances. Major breakthroughs in the detection and treatment of disease are increasing life expectancy and reducing vulnerability to sickness."
Patent protection fundamentally underpins the continued research and development for new and better medicines for diseases, including those which occur in the developing world. Undermining intellectual property rights could have serious implications for the flow of new treatments and vaccines.
HIV/Aids in the developing world, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, is a crisis of devastating proportions. The successful use of complex and demanding combination treatments, which have made such an impact in the west, in developing country circumstances is a massive challenge. Simplistic suggestions that drug prices are the main problem are frankly irresponsible.
The South African health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang set into context the issues of increasing access to HIV/Aids treatments in developing countries last week: "The problem of access to HIV and Aids-related treatment will not be adequately addressed by simply cutting the prices of anti-retroviral drugs. Care for HIV/Aids-related infections should be addressed in a holistic
way including treatment for opportunistic infections and any agreement in this regard should cover issues of sustainability, accessibility as well as affordability."
That notwithstanding, Glaxo SmithKline has been offering preferential prices for HIV/Aids medicines in Africa since 1997 and last year increased the price reduction offered as part of the UN-led "accelerating access initiative". Our prices in Africa are at a level with, if not better than, those offered by generic manufacturers. The initiative is a model that recognises the need for a holistic approach in which public/private partnership tackles the problem of HIV/Aids in developing countries. Senegal, Uganda and Rwanda are already obtaining anti-retroviral treatments from us under the initiative at very substantially discounted prices, and others will follow.
The pharmaceutical industry is already making a significant contribution to generating greater access to medicines and, we agree, it must continue to do more. Both Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham have been involved in many initiatives to combat health problems in the developing world, covering, not only HIV/Aids, but also malaria, TB, lymphatic filiariasis and childhood immunisation.
Glaxo SmithKline will continue and indeed strengthen its commitment in this area. We are determined to play as full a role as we are able, in partnership with all other stakeholders, in the global effort.
The fundamental problems of poverty and under-resourced health systems identified by Oxfam are simply too great to be addressed except as a shared responsibility of all sectors of society, including national governments in both the developing and the industrialised world; NGOs; industry; and international agencies such as WHO, Unaids, the World Bank and Unicef. I urge Oxfam to
play a positive role in this partnership.
--
Send mail for the `E-Drug' conference to `e-drug@usa.healthnet.org'.
Mail administrative requests to `majordomo@usa.healthnet.org'.
For additional assistance, send mail to: `owner-e-drug@usa.healthnet.org'.