AFRO-NETS> NGOs Question Transparency in Price of AIDS Drugs

[Dieter Neuvians MD <neuvians@mweb.co.zw>]

NGOs Question Transparency in Price of AIDS Drugs
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Panafrican News Agency (Dakar)
Posted to the web February 21, 2001 

Nairobi, Kenya 

NGOs, including Medicins Sans Frontiers, which are concerned about 
AIDS Wednesday denounced what they termed lack of transparency in 
multi-national HIV/AIDS drug deal for Third World countries. 

At a packed media conference in Nairobi, the NGOs also questioned the 
sincerity of the drug-makers, who in May 2000 promised a 85-percent 
reduction in drug prices, but have so far only lowered their prices 
by 20-25 percent to the detriment of AIDS sufferers, especially in 
Africa. 

The NGOs, gathered under the aegis of the Kenya Coalition of NGOs on 
Access to Medicines, the Action Aid Kenya, condemned the lack of 
transparency in price negotiations between the big pharmaceutical 
companies, UNAIDS and the Kenyan government. Therefore, they called 
for the lowering of prices as promised. 

"Millions of people throughout Africa are dying because of lack of 
treatment," they said in statement. 

"Multinationals are the biggest profit makers in the world, and that 
is why they came up with the idea of price reduction in May. But that 
was just a smokescreen they wanted to use to protect their empire," 
said Fr. Angelo D'Agostino of Nyumbani, an AIDS orphanage. 

Unwilling to wait any longer to treat their patients, Nyumbani an-
nounced that they would order drugs from generic manufacturers. 

In a wild move meant to pre-empt a similar scenario like the South 
African case where drug companies are against a government decision 
to bring in generic drugs, the coalition called on the Kenya govern-
ment and UNAIDS and other African governments to turn to generic 
drugs which are relatively cheaper. 

The pharmaceutical companies plan to take South African government to 
court 5 March for promoting the use of generic medicines to fight 
AIDS and its opportunistic infections. 

However, the coalition said, for NGOs in South Africa and Kenya, the 
basic right to health and cheap, quality treatment must take prece-
dent over corporate protection of patents and profit margins and po-
litical support by donors and government is needed. 

Members of the coalition feel the South African court case is likely 
going to be used to intimidate other African countries whose laws 
would allow the importation and patenting of generic drugs. 

Uganda and Ghana have been discussing proposals to import in the com-
ing few months the Indian company Cipla's cheap version of Combivir, 
which combines AZT and 3TC in one pill. 

"What we are currently working on is a global push, either through 
mass demonstrations in South Africa or mass awareness to push govern-
ments to import generic drugs without fear of being sued or compro-
mised. We do not want the South African experience in any other Afri-
can country," said Indra Van Gisbergen, lawyer and campaigner for the 
coalition. 

In a move critics say was meant to block the importation of generics, 
last May, Merck and Co., Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., Roche, GlaxoSmith-
kline Plc, and Boehringer-Ingelheim, offered to reduce the prices for 
AIDS medicine by up to 85 percent to nations in sub-Saharan Africa. 

Before price reduction, the typical annual cost for the AIDS-drug 
cocktails in the US and Europe was 10,000-15,000 US dollars per pa-
tient, unaffordable by the poor in Africa. 

"With a choice of cheap, quality ARV drugs, more lives could be 
saved," Dr. Chris Ouma of Action Aid Kenya said. 

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