Last Cheaper AIDS Medicines For Rwanda Under WTO

The 18th of September will mark the last shipment of lower-cost HIV/AIDS medicines from Canada to Rwanda under a World Trade Organization-sanctioned arrangement. The first shipment of the antiretroviral combination drug manufactured by Canadian pharmaceutical company Apotex was sent in September 2008, the second one had to take place in September 2009. The shipments were made possible through Canada’s Access to Medicine Regime (CAMR) set up to implement the so-called WTO “30 August 2003 decision,” or “paragraph 6” implemention. This decision allows WTO members who produce pharmaceutical products under compulsory licence to ship a majority of it to developing countries lacking production capacity. Before this, TRIPS said that drugs produced under CL had to be for “predominately” domestic use. The decision became an amendment of the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) in December 2005.

According to the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, Apotex has said it will not make further attempt to use the Canadian access regime, blaming the long procedure it took to obtain a single licence authorising the shipment of a single AIDS drug to a single developing country. “In its current form, CAMR is unlikely to be used again due to the procedural requirements it puts on developing countries and generic pharmaceutical manufacturers,” they said.

Only one compulsory licence has been granted under the 30 August 2003 decision, according to Legal Network Executive Director Richard Elliott, and no other drug manufacturer in Canada is trying to use the opportunity with the current regime.

A change in legislation would be the only way forward, he said. Two bills currently in the Parliament backed by civil society groups would streamline the CAMR with a simplified “one-licence solution”. This would avoid the current requirement for separate negotiations with patent-holding pharmaceutical companies for each purchasing country and each order of medicines.

HIV/AIDS Legal Network Q&A here [pdf]

WTO information page here.