ISDS Case Map
medicines
Writing pharmaceutical regulations into international trade deals can have costly consequences.
A quick analysis of the leaked text shows there are good reasons to be concerned that the TPP's generous IP protections could still prove a minefield for efforts to control drug costs in Canada
Ahead of a meeting between Indian Prime Minister Modi and German Chancellor Merkel this week, European manufacturers had already protested India’s patents policy, arguing that it doesn’t protect sensitive technology.
The TPP’s intellectual property chapter represents nothing less than a disaster for global health. Many harmful provisions still remain in the final chapter, bearing out the concerns of public health advocates.
The TPP could give pharmaceutical corporations more power to control medicine markets and “impose higher prices for longer.”
The lack of access to details in the text means governments can put a positive spin on the deal, but the devil is in the detail.
Australia — along with others such as New Zealand and Chile — has been unwilling to offer more than five years protection for the medicines, because longer terms would increase the cost of state-subsidised medical programs.
Countries in the trade bloc would have an alternative of either providing eight years of exclusivity to biologic drugs, or providing five years of so-called data exclusivity plus up to three more years under a regulatory framework in the TPP.
A standoff between Australia and the United States on monopoly rules forpharmaceutical drugs has emerged as the ultimate impediment to clinching anhistoric trade deal sweeping across 12 Pacific Rim countries.
The latest round of trade talks between Taiwan and the U.S. under the bilateral Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA) made much ground in a number of areas but both sides have yet to reach consensus on issues such as U.S. pork imports.
