Access to medicines and international issues
All costs, no benefits: How TRIPS-plus intellectual property rules in the US-Jordan FTA affect access to medicines
TRIPS-plus rules are preventing poor people from accessing affordable medicines
Authors:
; Oxfam
Publisher:
Oxfam, 2007
This Oxfam report examines the impact of the TRIPS-plus rules on access to medicines in Jordan. Jordan was the first country to introduce these high levels of intellectual property protection as part of a free trade agreement with the United States (US). The report finds that medicine prices in Jordan have increased by 20 per cent since 2001. In particular, data exclusivity (which blocks the registration and marketing approval of generic medicines for five or more years) has delayed generic competition for 79 per cent of medicines between 2002 and mid-2006, that otherwise would have been available in an inexpensive, generic form. Higher medicine prices are now affecting the financial sustainability of government public health programmes.
The report concludes that the TRIPS-plus rules have created significant new costs for Jordan that will threaten access to medicines, and the claimed benefits of TRIPS-plus measures have not emerged. To reduce the burden of the US-TRIPS plus agenda and its affects on access to medicines, Oxfam recommends: Jordan to introduce exceptions to data exclusivity that reduce its impact on generic competition; US to stop coercing developing countries into adopting TRIPS plus intellectual property protections through bi-lateral and regional trade agreements and through other forms of pressure and inducement.
