Poor Nations Pick Up Tab as Obama Woos Big Pharma

By Jason Farago, Newser Staff

Posted Aug 20, 2009 8:15 AM CDT

(Newser) – The Obama administration is thwarting poor countries' access to affordable drugs in order to win Big Pharma's support for health care reform, according to Doctors Without Borders and other NGOs. As the Los Angeles Times reports, governments from Asia to Latin America are feeling pressure from Washington on their use of generics, even on treatments for HIV/AIDS. "It's appalling coming as it does from the Obama White House," says one activist.

While drug companies can obtain patents to prevent cheaper knockoffs, international treaties allow governments to override patents to increase access to critical medicines. Yet last spring US trade representatives lashed out at poor countries for violating patents, and some countries are already buckling; Guatemala, for one, is now paying market price for AIDS drugs. "We had hoped for change" from Bush policies, said a Doctors Without Borders worker. "However, we now view the Obama administration as no different."

[Images (3)]

[Quotes (1)]

A Brazilian customs worker prepares boxes of the generic HIV medicine Efavirenz. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

A nurse prepares a swine flu vaccine in Australia. (AP Photo/CSL, Michael Laurie)

President Barack Obama speaks about health care reform during a town hall meeting in Belgrade, Mont., Friday, Aug. 14, 2009. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

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The substance of these reports read as if they were written by a lobbyist for the pharmaceutical industry. - James Love of Knowledge Ecology International, after a State Department meeting on affordable drugs

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 15 comments

cognitivefilter

Aug 21, 2009 4:37 AM CDT

brazil has one of the best hiv/aids cocktails in the entire world. we should take a fucking tip from them and stop trying to appease big pharma's takeover of the world. that this is trickling down from obama's white house is simply appalling.

prowlerzee

Aug 20, 2009 11:35 AM CDT

"We had hoped for change" from Bush policies, said a Doctors Without Borders worker. "However, we now view the Obama administration as no different." DUH. SOME OF US TOLD YOU SO.

prowlerzee

Aug 20, 2009 11:33 AM CDT

The Trojan Ass who hijacked the Dem primary not only gets to continue the corporations' bidding and continue the Bush-Cheney agenda, but they also get the benefit of destroying support for the Dem party as well! Win-win for them. All because the so-call "reality-based" progressives were even easier to dupe than those who voted for Bush. Thanks, MORON. I'm not surprised at all at your continued stupidity at not seeing that you will continue to play into their hands in the future.

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drug companies • generic drugs • health care reform • Doctors Without Borders • HIV/AIDS • pharmaceutical industry • Obama administration • NGOs

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