Thailand Reduces Costs of HIV/AIDS Medication

[Gaybutton]

BANGKOK, Nov 30 (TNA)

 

Thailand's Ministry of Public Health announced on Wednesday that it would invoke the compulsory licensing clause in the Patent Act to allow for lower-cost local production of the life-saving anti-viral drug, Efavirenz, which is needed by thousands of people living with HIV/AIDs. So far, most people with AIDS have been priced out of the market.

 

The move is expected to save thousands of lives in Thailand, and to raise the quality of life for families who have been forced to use up limited family income for medications.

 

The decision, with immediate effect, will pave the way for the Government Pharmaceutical Organisation (GPO) to mass-produce a cheaper version of the drug for local use. Production is expected to start in June next year.

 

The compulsory licensing would be valid for only five years but Public Health Minister Mongkol Na Songkhla told reporters that the move was necessary given the growing number of people with HIV/Aids and the government limited budget.

 

Thailand is one of a few countries in the world which provides free or low-cost anti-viral treatments to AIDS patients.

 

"This drug is more effective than others and its users show few side effects. Although it is still under patent protection, it is needed to save lives and help us cope with the growing public health crisis caused by AIDS," the minister said.

 

At the current market price, only one in four patients in Thailand have access to Efavirenz. Compulsory licensing of the drug is expected to enable the National Health Security Office to increase the number of HIV-infected people who receive the drug through state channels to about 100,000, a substantial increase from the current 25,000 people with AIDS who now are helped.

 

There are over one million people living with HIV/AIDs in Thailand, about half of them need to use the anti-viral treatments.

 

Under the agreement, the patent owner would be paid 0.5 per cent of sales from the GPO as compensation. Thai patent law allows state enforced compulsory licensing in the case of drugs being critically needed to save people's lives, providing that the state is unable to afford to subsidise them.

 

(TNA)-E110

 

 

 

[TotallyOz]

That is good news. Also today:

 

 

Clinton launches child HIV drug

http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/conditions/...s.ap/index.html

 

NEW DELHI, India (AP) -- Former President Bill Clinton and two Indian pharmaceutical companies have struck an agreement to cut prices of HIV and AIDS treatment for children, making the lifesaving drugs far more accessible worldwide, Clinton's foundation's anti-AIDS initiative said.

 

The companies will supply drugs for HIV-positive children at prices as low as 16 cents a day, or less than $60 a year, according to a statement by the Clinton Foundation HIV/AIDS Initiative.

 

The deal will enable an additional 100,000 HIV-positive children in 62 countries to receive treatment in 2007, the foundation said.

 

Clinton was to announce the deal in a speech at a New Delhi children's hospital Thursday at the launch of a new national program by the Indian government to treat HIV-positive children. World AIDS Day is Friday.

 

Under the agreement, the two companies -- Cipla Ltd. and Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd. -- will supply 19 different antiretroviral formulations for prices about 45 percent less than the lowest current rates for these drugs in developing countries, the statement said.

 

"Though the world has made progress in expanding HIV/AIDS treatment to adults, children have been left behind. Only one in 10 children who needs treatment is getting it," Clinton said in a statement.

 

In January, Clinton negotiated the reduction of prices of rapid HIV tests and anti-AIDS drugs for adults. Several Indian firms were involved in that deal, too.

 

Under the deal, countries including France, Brazil, Chile, Norway and Britain will provide $35 million and the Clinton Foundation HIV/AIDS Initiative will contribute $15 million.

 

The drugs will be supplied to the countries where the children live, for distribution through public health and HIV/AIDS prevention programs.

 

Clinton was to speak at the Kalawati Saran Hospital, one of New Delhi's busiest hospitals for children. India, with 5.7 million HIV-positive people, has the highest number of cases in the world.

 

The new India-specific deal to be announced Thursday would provide HIV treatment for 10,000 Indian children by March 2007 by adding pediatric care to all adult HIV and AIDS treatment centers in the country.

 

Clinton, whose two-year appointment as U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special tsunami envoy ends December 31, is visiting India, Cambodia, Thailand and Indonesia -- among the countries hardest hit by the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed more than 216,000 people in 12 countries in December 2004.

[Gaybutton]

The following appears in THE NATION:

_____

 

Merck to Offer AIDS Drug Price Cut to Thailand

 

Merck & Co. Inc. will offer to cut the price of a key anti-HIV drug in Thailand in an attempt to stop that country's government from using cheaper generic suppliers and overriding the U.S. drug giant's patents, the Financial Times reported on its website Thursday.

 

A spokesman for Merck's local unit, MSD Thailand, said the company would seek talks with health officials to propose discounts or a "voluntary" license to the Thai government pharmaceuticals organization to produce generic versions of its drug, Efavirenz.

 

Merck's move follows Thailand's surprise decision this week to threaten a "compulsory license" for Efavirenz to overturn Merck's patents, raising fears by western pharmaceutical companies of a significant challenge to their intellectual property.

[Guest Aunty]

It's good that Merck will sell its HIV drugs in Thailand cheaper hopefully stoping Thailand from 'patent busting' and in effect stealing Merck's intellectual property, but this does raise a wider issue. Given that it now costs about US$800,000,000 to bring a drug to market (for any disease), who

[Guest colinr]

The high prices charged by western drug companies are due more to their advertising bills than to research. Not to mention greed. And a lot of their research is frivolous - to produce new medicines for rich people to cure conditions they didn't know they had, until they read the adverts or were talked into buying by their doctor, previously nobbled by the drug companies with free gifts etc. Where's the research on eg malaria? Research does not anyway depend on the companies; I believe the HIV drugs were produced originally by US Government laboratories and then handed to the companies to produce and market.

 

 

 

 

[Guest Aunty]

I'm aware that there are a number of people who hold similar views to yourself colinr, but you are mistaken if you think that the major cost component of a new drug's price is in its advertising costs.

 

I think the following article from the New York Times about Pfizer's recent decision to pull from clinical trial a heart drug goes a long way to addressing many of your claims about drug companies which are quite incorrect.

 

By the way HIV drugs were not produced in US Govt. laboratories and then handed over to drug companies to produce and produce, or are you talking about the same US Govt. lab's that supposedly created the HIV virus back in the 80's in the first place? That was a popular conspiracy theory of the time too.

 

 

End of Drug Trial Is a Big Loss for Pfizer and Heart Patients

 

By Alex Berenson | December 4, 2006

The news came to Pfizer

[Guest colinr]

I'm aware that there are a number of people who hold similar views to yourself colinr, but you are mistaken if you think that the major cost component of a new drug's price is in its advertising costs.

 

I think the following article from the New York Times about Pfizer's recent decision to pull from clinical trial a heart drug goes a long way to addressing many of your claims about drug companies which are quite incorrect.

 

By the way HIV drugs were not produced in US Govt. laboratories and then handed over to drug companies to produce and produce, or are you talking about the same US Govt. lab's that supposedly created the HIV virus back in the 80's in the first place? That was a popular conspiracy theory of the time too.

End of Drug Trial Is a Big Loss for Pfizer and Heart Patients

 

By Alex Berenson | December 4, 2006

The news came to Pfizer

[Guest colinr]

I'm aware that there are a number of people who hold similar views to yourself colinr, but you are mistaken if you think that the major cost component of a new drug's price is in its advertising costs.

 

I think the following article from the New York Times about Pfizer's recent decision to pull from clinical trial a heart drug goes a long way to addressing many of your claims about drug companies which are quite incorrect.

 

By the way HIV drugs were not produced in US Govt. laboratories and then handed over to drug companies to produce and produce, or are you talking about the same US Govt. lab's that supposedly created the HIV virus back in the 80's in the first place? That was a popular conspiracy theory of the time too.

End of Drug Trial Is a Big Loss for Pfizer and Heart Patients

 

By Alex Berenson | December 4, 2006

The news came to Pfizer

[Guest colinr]

1. People who have studied pharmaceutical company accounts have found that advertising is a major cost - sometimes more than research. This costs has to be recovered from sales.

 

2. You may be right about the HIV drugs - but it is still the case that the world does not have to depend on these companies for research.

 

3. I don't dispute that companies do research, that it is expensive, and that there are losses when they find they've been barking up the wrong tree. But companies want to make money and their research is aimed at producing medicines for richer people. Heart disease is perhaps case in point.

 

4. Production of cheap generics does not disadvantage the companies unless you suppose that the poor patients would have paid Western prices had the cheaper versions not been available. They couldn't; they would just die. The companies would lose only if there were widespread smuggling of generics back to the West. That risk can be mitigated and surely should be taken when lives are at stake.