Posted on 01 April 2009
Ottawa (April 1, 2009) – Yesterday, Senator Yoine Goldstein tabled Bill S-232 to amend Canada’s Access to Medicines Regime (CAMR), a precedent setting law enacted in 2004 with all-party support aimed at helping developing countries acquire affordable generic medicines through compulsory licensing in order to fight diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. To date, however, it is widely acknowledged that CAMR has not delivered on that pledge.
“CAMR has proven to be a complex and expensive mechanism with little tangible benefit to poor African countries that cannot pay the higher prices charged by patent-holders for brand-name drugs. CAMR has only been used once, for a single shipment of a single AIDS drug to a single country. It has not put lives before patents, precisely what this groundbreaking legislation was intended to do. No generic manufacturer is willing to go through the CAMR process in its current form.” said Goldstein.
The Act to amend the Patent Act (drugs for international humanitarian purposes) would, in fact, eliminate the unnecessary and counterproductive features currently hindering the efficacy of the Regime within the bounds of Canada’s obligations under the WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS).
Generic manufacturers would be able to obtain a single, open-ended compulsory licence that authorizes the export of any pharmaceutical product patented in Canada to any eligible country specified in the legislation, without the restriction of determining the quantity of the drug that will be needed in a given time period. Under the new streamlined mechanism, generic manufacturers would still be required to disclose the details of the contract and pay the applicable royalty according to the formula in the current legislation. Additionally, the packaging would have to be appropriately labelled to preclude the re-exporting of the product.
The Patent Act would also be amended to make it easier for NGOs to purchase and distribute Canadian-made generics in developing countries. Among other features, Bill S-232 would seek to repeal sections providing numerous opportunities for vexatious litigation which have deterred many purchasers from making effective use of CAMR.
With 33 million people worldwide infected with HIV-AIDS and with only four million of them having access to drug treatments, a key component of this battle shamefully remains mired in red tape in Canada.” noted Senator Goldstein. “I firmly believe Canada has a golden opportunity to signal its intention to continue the global fight against AIDS, first and foremost, by fixing CAMR.