Enemies of the Future: GLAXO WELLCOME

[Guest guest]

Excerpted from " Enemies of the Future: The Ten Worst

Corporations of 2000 " By Mokhiber and

Weissman Multinational Monitor, December 2000

GLAXO WELLCOME: PATENTS OVER PEOPLE

More than 35 million people around the world have

HIV/AIDS, well over 20 million in sub-Saharan Africa.

Thirty-six percent of adults in Botswana have

HIV/AIDS. About 3 million Africans die annually from

HIV/AIDS.

In the United States, as well as other rich countries,

drug treatments enable many or most of those with

HIV/AIDS to survive.

But the life-saving drug cocktails are very expensive

-

costing $10,000 to $15,000 or more per person per

year.

These prices are unaffordable for all but a tiny few

in Africa, where per capita incomes generally

register in the hundreds of dollars. So for Africans,

an HIV/AIDS diagnosis is a death sentence.

In a rational and humane world, the life-saving drugs

would be made available to Africans, who would enjoy

the same access to treatment as those in the rich

countries.

Unfortunately, we don't live in a rational world.

Instead, drug companies use patents and various

intellectual property protections to block

distribution of cheap, generic versions of HIV/AIDS

and other drugs. Since the cost of drug production is

actually

very low, these generic versions can reduce prices by

95 percent or more.

For years, the pharmaceutical industry was able to

count on the U.S. government to pressure developing

countries not to undertake to make generics available

- even when those countries sought to adhere to the

restrictive rules of the World Trade Organization. In

the face of strong domestic pressure from AIDS

activists and others, the U.S. government has

backed down from many of the more extreme threats it

made against developing countries in connection with

the drug access issue, though it has continued to seek

to deter the use of generics through its aid and

trade policy [see " AIDS Drugs for Africa, " ltinational

Monitor, September 1999].

While the U.S. government has restrained itself, the

drug companies continue to do everything they can to

block generic competition. Their great fear is not

losing markets in Africa - where sales are miniscule -

but that competition and lower prices in developing

countries will generate pressure for competition and

lower prices in other countries, especially the

United States, where industry profiteering is at its

peak.

Glaxo Wellcome, now planning to merge with Kline

Beecham, has emerged as a particular menace among the

drug industry cartel. (Burroughs Wellcome, now merged

with Glaxo, was an early villain in the effort to

promote access to AIDS medicines, charging

astronomical prices for AZT, one of the first

successful anti-AIDS drugs, and one developed by the

U.S. government.

And, in August, Glaxo dispatched a threatening letter

to Cipla, an Indian generic drug maker, objecting to

Cipla's distribution of a mall amunt of Combivir - a

combination of two anti-AIDS drugs for which Glaxo

claims to hold patent rights - in Ghana.

" Importation of Duovir [Cipla's version of Combvir]

into Ghana by Cipla or any of its affiliates

represents an infringement of our Company's exclusive

patent rights, " Glaxo instructed Cipla.

In November, Cipla announced it would stop exporting

Duovir to Ghana, even though it contested Glaxo's

patent claims. At stake is whether Cipla

will sell low-cost AIDS drugs in Ghana.

Ghana may represent only a sliver of Glaxo's revenue,

" but where do you draw the line? " Sutton, a

Glaxo spokesperson, said to the Wall Street Journal.

Low-cost sales of AIDS drugs by Cipla and other

generic

manufacturers in Africa could suddenly make treatment

within reach of hundreds of thousands or make it

feasible for foreign aid and philanthropic efforts to

be devoted to treatment options.

Glaxo's actions make the day when that finally happens

further off.

Meanwhile, the death toll mounts.

_______________

Weissman

E-mail: rob@...

Essential Information