Item 1

Thousands of People with HIV Protest India-EU Trade Deal Restricting Access to Cheap Drugs
 
Nirmala George
Associated Press, 4:09 AM PST, March 2, 2011

NEW DELHI (AP) — Thousands of people with HIV and cancer marched through the streets of India's capital Wednesday to protest a planned trade deal with the European Union that they claim would restrict access to affordable medicines.

The protesters say that under the terms of the new free trade agreement being negotiated by India and the EU, generic versions of lifesaving drugs would no longer be cheaply available.

Holding placards and shouting, "We want to live," about 3,000 protesters marched through central New Delhi before holding a meeting near Parliament.

Indian officials declined to comment on the status of the negotiations underway in Brussels.

Health activists and people living with HIV had traveled from as far away as Thailand and Indonesia to participate in the rally.

Activists also warned that provisions in the deal would block generic versions of drugs from entering the market, even if the drugs' patents had expired.

"These are all ways to hinder competition from Indian drug manufacturers who make cheaper generic versions," Anand Grover, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, told journalists after the rally.

The restrictions would affect not just India, but people in developing countries that depend on Indian manufacturers for drug supplies.

"India is the pharmacy of the developing world," Grover said, adding that the restrictive provisions of the agreement would be "a colossal mistake."

Many of the rally participants said the effects of restrictions on drug production in India would be felt sharply in Asia and Africa.

"These drugs are our lifeline. We have seen many deaths among friends and family because they could not afford imported medicines," said Rajiv Kafle, an HIV activist who had traveled 30 hours by bus from Nepal to participate in the rally.

"We have a simple message for the Indian government: Don't trade away our lives in the EU-India FTA," he said.

Kafle's views were supported by Malaysian lawmaker Charles Santiago, who said many Asian countries depended on medicines from India.

"If India caves in, then the pressure on Asia to access affordable medicines for HIV and Hepatitis C sufferers would be tremendous," Santiago said.

Item 2

HIV Protesters Tell India to Defy EU Drug Demands

by
AFP, Published Wednesday, March 02, 2011

Thousands of HIV-positive protesters called on the Indian government on Wednesday to reject EU trade demands they said would make lifesaving drugs unaffordable to millions of people with the virus.

More than 2,000 demonstrators from India and other Asian countries marched through downtown New Delhi carrying banners reading "Don't trade away our lives" and staged a lie-in.

The European Union (EU) is seeking provisions in a proposed trade deal that would push prices of generic drugs made in India beyond the reach of people with the HIV virus in developing countries, said the protesters.

"More than 80 percent of the AIDS drugs our medical practitioners use to treat 175,000 people in developing countries are affordable generics from India," said Paul Cawthorne, a spokesman for Paris-based humanitarian group Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF).

"Beyond AIDS, we rely on producers in India for drugs to treat other illnesses, such as tuberculosis and malaria.  We can not afford to let our patients' lifeline be cut," Cawthorne said.

Affordable medicines produced in India have played a major role in scaling up HIV/AIDS treatment to more than five million people in developing countries, MSF said.

Indian-made generics have pushed the average yearly cost of anti-HIV drug treatments down from ๊10,000 per patient in 2000 to ๊70 in 2010.

"We all rely on affordable medicines made here in India to stay alive," said Nepal-based Rajiv Kafle, of the Asia Pacific Network of Positive People.

"We don't want to go back in time, to when our friends and loved ones died because they couldn't afford the medicines they needed," Kafle said.

The EU is demanding intellectual property provisions in the free trade agreement that exceed what international trade rules require, MSF said.

The most damaging measure is "data exclusivity" which would act like a patent and block more affordable generic medicines from the market, even for drugs that are already off patent, the group said.

"It would be a colossal mistake to introduce data exclusivity in India, when millions of people across the globe depend on the country as the 'pharmacy of the developing world'," said Anand Grover, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health.

The protest was staged to coincide with "sensitive" negotiations in Brussels between India and the 27-member EU on the market-opening pact, which has been under discussion since 2007, MSF said.