Trade in health services
World Trade Organisation agreements: implications for equity and health in Southern Africa
Fair in theory, unfair in practice: TRIPS and health care in Southern Africa
Authors:
R. Loewenson; G. Munot; V. Tyson
Publisher:
EQUINET: Network for Equity in Health in Southern Africa, 2000
This paper investigates the consequences of WTO agreements relating to health, and primarily the TRIPS agreement on health care and drug access for Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries.
The paper provides a brief review of GATT /WTO and WTO agreements relating to health. It examines the impact of WTO and TRIPS on health and health care and looks at actual and potential responses to TRIPS / GATS in the SADC region.
Key issues it considers are:
- at a time when the HIV/AIDS epidemic is devastating the populations of the countries of southern Africa the TRIPS Agreement will make accessing drugs will be more difficult and more expensive
- Theoretically, TRIPS legitimates the use of compulsory licensing and parallel imports by national governments however this principle has been challenged by invocation of other trade agreements by the US
- In its legal aspects, WTO has reversed the notion of burden of proof therefore in cases of violation of intellectual property rights brought by multinational pharmaceutical companies, the defendant, such as a developing country member, could have difficulty mustering the legal resources to prove itself innocent
The paper asks whether WTO-TRIPS is fair or unfair. It concludes that in theory WTO-TRIPS is a fair multilateral treaty that balances public needs and private intellectual property. However in practice WTO-TRIPS is implemented in a restrictive fashion to prioritise IPR interests over public needs.
