Dying for Drugs

This past Monday I was honored to receive an email from the Aids Project Los Angeles, asking to use one of my photographs for their Spanish-language magazine, Impacto!. The magazine is distributed throughout the Americas, and the upcoming edition will include an article about the impact that CAFTA will have on those living with HIV-AIDS.

Of course I readily agreed. Of all the provisions in CAFTA, few are as blatantly evil (and I don't use that word lightly) as those relating to Intellectual Property laws.

In short: CAFTA extends the patent protections offered to major Pharmaceutical companies, thereby limiting the production of low-cost generic drugs. This is nothing less than a death sentence for the men, women and children already burdened by the twin threats of illness and poverty.

I've just finished reading Drug Deal , an interesting article about the subject posted on the AlterNet website. Here are some excerpts:

More than 78,000 Guatemalans are currently living with HIV/AIDS , according to Doctors Without Borders. Approximately 13,500 of them are in urgent need of antiretroviral treatment; only 3,600 were receiving it as of December 2004.

If, in coming weeks, the U.S. Congress ratifies the bill President Bush signed last year -- the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) -- many of these patients could wind up literally dying for cheap drugs.

According to groups such as Oxfam and Doctors Without Borders, CAFTA's intellectual property protections will give monopoly-like status to high-priced, brand-name drugs in poor markets; potentially killing off generics in Central America and preventing millions of AIDS patients from being able to afford the medicine they need.

Look how much more expensive the brand-name versions are...

In two Guatemala City hospitals, and health centers in Coatepeque and Puerto Barrios, Doctors Without Borders administers antiretroviral medicines to 1,100 patients. Because these meds haven't been patented there, MSF is able to treat more patients -- it dispenses drugs that are 75% to 99% cheaper than the brand-name drugs bought by the Guatemalan government.

Example: Doctors Without Borders pays $216 per person per year for the generic version of AZT+3TC, a part of triple combination ARV therapy. Guatemala's social security system, which buys brand-name, shells out $4,818 per person per year for the same combination.

And some final wise words...

"We are disgusted that the government finds it more important to protect the commercial interests of private industry rather than public health," said Rachel Cohen, advocacy liaison for Doctors Without Borders' Access to Essential Medicines Campaign.

"It is unacceptable that health is so subordinate to trade and economic industry. We are fighting for lives of patients, and we do not accept that health is traded away like any other commodity."

Other Resources:

New Guatemalan law and intellectual property provisions in DR-CAFTA threaten access to affordable medicines