The Executive Board of UNITAID, the international health financing agency, will meet Dec. 14-15 in Geneva to decide on the future direction of the Patent Pool for AIDS medicines. International medical humanitarian organization Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is concerned that a number of pharmaceutical companies are seeking to exclude developing countries categorized as ‘middle-income’ from benefiting from medicines made under licence from the Pool.  If these companies are successful, people living with HIV/AIDS will be made to pay the price.

The Patent Pool has the potential to safeguard access to life-saving treatment for people living with HIV in the developing world by lowering the cost of existing improved first-line and second-line treatments and accelerating the development and generic production of new and more affordable quality drugs, including new fixed-dose combination and child-friendly medicines.

“Countries like South Africa, Brazil, Peru, Thailand, India or China are considered lucrative emerging markets for pharmaceutical companies. But they are also countries with significant AIDS epidemics and face rising drug costs. If they are excluded this will have drastic consequences for patients,” said Michelle Childs, Director of Policy/Advocacy at MSF’s Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines.  “We’re concerned that UNITAID may give in to the companies’ demands and move away from its commitment to ensure access to medicines for people living with HIV in all developing countries.”

In the township of Khayelitsha, South Africa, MSF is witnessing the acute need for affordable, new AIDS medicines: 16 percent of patients in this MSF-supported project fail the first-line of HIV treatment within five years and need to take newer second-line drugs. But the prices of these newer medicines are dramatically higher. In some countries, switching a patient from a first to second-line drug regimen increases the cost of treatment as much as seventeen-fold. A third-line regimen, for those failing second-line, is currently estimated to cost around $2,440 per patient per year.

According to UNAIDS more than eight million people are currently living with HIV/AIDS in Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe, and the Caribbean – many of these countries are classified as ‘middle-income’. If drug companies are allowed to exclude these countries from the scheme the Patent Pool will fall far short of its promise.

“In Brazil, just one newer drug, atazanavir, is so expensive that it is eating up most of the government’s budget for AIDS medicines,” said Gabriela Chaves, MSF pharmacist in Brazil. “With increasing need for newer drugs, costs risk spiralling out of control.  The consequences of being excluded from the Patent Pool will be paid by people living with HIV/AIDS.”

It is critically important that the UNITAID board make explicit their original commitment that the Patent Pool should benefit all developing countries and that the process for agreeing to terms and conditions include addressing the needs of patients in ‘middle-income’ countries.

“What’s at stake is the potential of the Patent Pool to defuse what’s being called the treatment timebomb,” said Childs. “In addition to the use of other public health safeguards like strict patentability criteria and compulsory licensing, a Patent Pool offers a voluntary solution. All patients, including those in middle-income countries, need to benefit.”

Related News:

 South Africa: Conditions deteriorate for fleeing Zimbabweans - 01.03.2010 12:45

 India: Court gives boost to access to medicines, latest appeal by Bayer rejected - 09.02.2010 16:11

 Geneva: Patent pool adopted - 15.12.2009 09:47

 MSF calls on drug companies to pool HIV patents - 01.10.2009 16:43

 HIV/AIDS treatment: Optimize now, or pay more later… - 20.07.2009 12:16