[e-drug] MSF Access Campaign comments on TPP IP negotiations - Lima round

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E-DRUG: MSF Access Campaign comments on TPP IP negotiations - Lima round
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Please find below comments from Judit Rius Sanjuan, US manager of the
Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Campaign for Access
to Essential Medicine, regarding the latest round of negotiations for the
Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement currently taking place in Lima, Peru:

'The leaked draft intellectual property proposals by the United States for
the Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement have confirmed our fears that the
Obama administration is walking away from previous efforts to ensure that
developing countries can access affordable medicines, setting a dangerous
new standard that will likely be replicated in future trade agreements
with developing nations.

'The administration is touting a so-called 'access window' as a mechanism
to boost access to medicines. In fact, the administration is confusing
access with affordability. The 'access window' is all about getting
brand-name drugs to market faster, and giving their producers longer
monopoly rights that prevent price-lowering competition and keeping
medicines out of the hands of the millions of people who need them.

'Our doctors who work across the developing world rely on affordable
generic medicines to treat patients. For example, competition among
generic manufacturers is what brought down drug prices for HIV/AIDS by 99
percent, from US$10,000 per person per year to roughly $100 today. Trade
agreements of the type being pushed this week in Peru threaten these types
of crucial gains in access to life-saving medicines.'

MSF TPP press release:
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.com/press/release.cfm?id=5519&cat=press-release
MSF TPP issue brief:
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/press/2011/MSF-TPP-Issue-Brief.pdf
MSF TPP Blog:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tido-von-schoenangerer/shooting-itself-in-the-fo_b_959847.html

Michelle French
Interim Press Officer
Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF)
333 Seventh Avenue, 2nd Floor
New York, NY 10001
Tel: +1 212.763.5765
Mobile: +1 646.207.0405
Fax: +1 212.679.7016
Email: michelle.french@newyork.msf.org
www.doctorswithoutborders.org