Leaders Say Eased Patent Accord Could Hurt AIDS Research

Leaders of the international pharmaceutical industry warned Wednesday that research and development into AIDS drugs could cease if global trading rules on patents are loosened. The warning was issued at a session of delegates to the World Trade Organization in Geneva. The session was convened to discuss whether Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreements should be amended to accommodate poor countries so that they can get medicine at low cost.

"More flexibility in TRIPS would be disastrous for continuing investment in research and development on AIDS," said Dr. Rolf Krebs, chair of Boehringer Ingelheim and president of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association. The global association's Director General Harvey Bale also indicated that easing up on the terms of the 1994 TRIPS accord could open the door for governments to abuse patents on all protected drugs by declaring national health emergencies when none existed.

Both men indicated that an industry threatened by such changes would be urged to focus research and development on other diseases that caused less controversy, such as cancer. "So it is important to maintain a stable basis for this industry to invest, not just for the sake of the shareholders but also in the public interest," said Bale.

Developing countries, backed by such nongovernmental organizations as Oxfam and Doctors Without Borders, argued that the rules put AIDS treatments and other patented drugs out of their financial reach, leaving millions to suffer and die. "The essential flaw of TRIPS is to oblige all countries, rich and poor, to grant at least 20 years' patent protection for new medicines, thereby delaying production of inexpensive generic substitutes upon which developing-country health services and people depend," said a statement of Oxfam. TRIPS has not yet gone into force in India or Brazil. This enables those two countries to allow local manufacture of generic forms of patented drugs and to sell them abroad under different names. No decisions were expected at the meeting; developing countries will press their campaign for a change at a WTO ministerial meeting set for Qatar in November.

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