E-drug: Guardian: Nigeria to Import Cheap Copies of HIV
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/aids/story/0,7369,616827,00.html
Defiant Nigeria to import cheap copies of HIV drugs
Rejection of copyright deal will infuriate multinationals
Chris McGreal in Johannesburg
Tuesday December 11, 2001
The Guardian
Nigeria has defied pressure from multinational pharmaceutical
companies by becoming the first African country to import cheap
copies of patented Aids drugs in a move watched closely by other
states on the continent worst hit by the disease.
The groundbreaking decision will infuriate big drug firms which have
been trying to coax African governments into de facto recognition of
copyright agreements by offering cut-price medicines.
But Nigeria says it will shortly begin distributing tons of drugs
produced by an Indian company, Cipla, at a fraction of the price
charged by the major drug firms. The imports will cut the cost of
anti-retrovirals from about �4,000 a year for patented medicines to
�225 for those Nigerians who benefit from the programme at hospitals
in several cities.
Over the coming months, distribution will be expanded to 10,000
people at 100 clinics across the country as part of a trial
programme that the government hopes will ultimately reach most of
Nigeria's 3.5m citizens with HIV.
Nigeria's announcement coincides with an international conference in
west Africa on Aids where several governments have demanded access
to affordable anti-HIV drugs.
Aids is now the primary killer in sub-Saharan Africa. Of the 28m
people living with HIV in the region, only a few tens of thousands
have access to anti-retroviral triple therapy relied on in the west.
Many of the others are expected to die within the decade. This year,
an estimated 2.3m people succumbed to Aids in sub-Saharan Africa.
The president of Burkina Faso, Blaise Compaore, opened the meeting
in Ouagadougou on Sunday by saying that the world is turning a blind
eye to Aids, which he described as a "major crisis retarding
development in African countries".
Access to medicines, he said, was "the domain of the north and the
sick and ailing are left to the south".
Nigeria's move follows the court victory by South Africa earlier
this year over a coalition of pharmaceutical firms which established
the right of governments to seek cheaper drugs to deal with health
emergencies such as Aids. Since then, the multinational drug
producers have sought to bind African states into long-term
agreements to use their products with offers of reduced prices and
the prospect of international aid subsidies.
Botswana - which has the highest rate of HIV infection in the world,
and where life expectancy is predicted to fall below 30 by the end
of the decade - says it will distribute anti-retroviral drugs to all
its citizens who need them within the coming months after reaching
pricing agreements with several big pharmaceutical companies.
It is still paying about twice what Nigeria is charged for similar
drugs, but Botswana believes that the real costs will be heavily
subsidised by donations. The Microsoft billionaire, Bill Gates, has
taken a personal interest in the Aids crisis in Botswana and the
government fears it could lose his support if it were to defy patent
agreements.
Other countries are not so fortunate. Kenya and Ghana in particular
will be carefully watching the reaction by the drug companies and
western governments to Nigeria's move. Both governments have been
discussing prices with generic drug producers.
Nigeria is unlikely to face any immediate legal action by the drugs
firms, in part because it does not recognise most of the patents
involved. But it may come under strong pressure to abide by
international patent agreements.
The French health minister, Bernard Kouchner, has pledged his
government's backing if poorer nations are more vocal in demanding
access to Aids drugs.
"If the countries of Africa do not themselves say they want the
treatment, it is not us who can do that for them," he said.
He urged African states to press the issue at a meeting in Brussels
next week to discuss the global fund to fight Aids and other
diseases.
The former president of Ghana, Jerry Rawlings, now a roving UN
ambassador on Aids, said just $1.5bn (�1.1bn) has been pledged to
the fund which leaders such as Tony Blair have said should have
$10bn a year to hand out.
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