Five years ago, the World Trade Organization came to an agreement, the so-called August 30th Decision, that was intended to increase access to affordable treatment for people in developing countries through the compulsory licensing of much needed medicines.
The idea was to incentivise the production and export of generic medicines from countries able to produce medicines to countries where no such production capacity existed but where the medicines were needed.
Billed as an ‘expeditious solution’ within existing international trade rules that would open up access to medicines to millions of patients in need, it’s proved to be unworkable and totally ineffective. Rather than incentivising the production of generic medicines, it has proved more of a “straitjacket for access”.
Five years on, the access crisis is far from resolved – in fact it’s getting worse as the cost of newer medicines, for example second-line antiretroviral drugs, shoots up.
Until September 2008, not a single drug had been exported under this process. Finally this month, five years after the agreement was concluded, the first shipment of a triple combination AIDS drug (AZT/3TC/NVP) was due to arrive in Rwanda where thousands are in need of these medicines.The second shipment is due to arrive in September 2009.
While MSF welcomes the fact that the drugs may finally arrive, it’s quite clear that a process that takes so long, for just one drug, for just one country is deeply flawed. Given the global situation where 70% of patients needing ART still do not have access to treatment, this procedure is simply not up to the task.
On the occasion of the WTO Public Forum 2008, MSF brought together key actors with experience in working with processing Compulsory Licenses to share their perceptions and generate discussion.
The workshop, held on September 25th 2008 at the WTO in Geneva, took for its starting point the question, Five years from the Decision to the action - is the 2003 August 30 Decision the "expeditious solution" for access to medicines we need? "
The evidence presented at the session clearly indicates that an overhaul of the August 30 system is called for." Ellen ‘t Hoen, Director Policy & Advocacy, MSF Access to Essential Medicines Campaign
Agenda of the meeting/invitation
Speaker presentations:
Sunjay Sudhir, Counsellor, Permanent Mission of India to WTO Geneva
Jorge Bermudez, Executive-Secretary, UNITAID
Respondent presentation:
Gianluca Susta, Member of the European Parliament
Press release:
Link here to article on the workshop published in IP-Watch