RP at odds with EU over issue of pharmaceutical licensing

The Philippines is at odds with the European Union (EU) over the issue of compulsory licensing to manufacture vital pharmaceutical products now being negotiated at the World Trade Organization (WTO).

The Philippines, along with other developing countries, is insisting on the Doha Declaration reached in 2001 which allowed compulsory licensing under the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement.

Normally, only licensed pharmaceutical firms are allowed to manufacture certain medicines, making them expensive and not readily available to all.

The EU has made a suggestion wherein a WTO member availing of the Doha-TRIPS mechanism should seek the advise of the World Health Organization (WHO).

EU Commissioner Pascal Lamy said that "certain members still have concerns as regards other potential public health problems."

"For these, we therefore need to find a mechanism to ensure that the Doha Declaration can be used in good faith," Lamy said.

But Trade and Industry Secretary Manuel Roxas II disagreed with Lamy’s suggestion to seek WTO’s advise.

"The Philippines finds the EUs proposal on the issue of scope of diseases detracts from the flexibility granted by the TRIPS Declaration allowing countries’ to determine on their own what constitutes public health problems, without need of confirmation or advise by any other country or international organization," Roxas said.

Roxas insisted that the Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health was designed to respond to concerns about the possible implications of the TRIPS Agreement on developing countries’ access to medicines.

"Clearly, the declaration intends to afford countries the unfettered right to determine what constitutes public health problems," the DTI chief lamented.

Roxas also disagreed with the EU’s view that only infectious diseases are primarily covered by the solution under the TRIPS Declaration.

"The Philippines has never agreed with this premise as it erodes the broad and comprehensive scope of public health problems agreed upon by ministers in Doha, " he said. – Marianne Go