AFRO-NETS> UNICEF lauds Canada's move to produce cheaper AIDS drugs for poor countries

[Claudio Schuftan <aviva@netnam.vn>]

UNICEF lauds Canada's move to produce cheaper AIDS drugs for poor countries
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New York, Sep 29 2003  5:00PM
 
The chief of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) today 
lauded Canada's push to quickly enact legislation allowing makers 
of generic medicines to export cheaper versions of patented 
HIV/AIDS drugs to poor countries heavily impacted by the pan-
demic.
 
"The hardest hit countries are seeing HIV prevalence rates as 
high as 40 per cent among young people. This scenario spells dev-
astation for these countries," Executive Director Carol Bellamy 
said. "Like Canada, other countries and players need to think 
much more creatively about steps they can take to energize and 
politicize the global response to this massive AIDS emergency."
 
If the law passes, Canada would become the first of the eight 
most industrialized countries to implement World Trade Organiza-
tion (WTO) agreements that allow heavily impacted countries to 
import antiretrovirals at a preferential price provided they can-
not produce the drugs domestically and would not use them for 
commercial purposes. 

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