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Novartis in India: Exploiting AIDS-victims
A.L.F. Crime Investigation Agency (CIA) - 18.04.2008 12:58
This information campaign is dedicated to the victims of Novartis AG: Gunned-down Brazilian farmers - Tortured, maimed and killed animals in labs - Victims of sexual exploitation by the management - Africans left to die for profit - Patients poisoned and killed with harmful drugs - Babies fed with unhealthy food
Part 6: Payback: Novartis To Slash Investment In India
The Novartis CEO Vasella says he will switch hundreds of millions of dollars in planned investments from India to other locations, primarily, China, in response to an Indian court ruling that he says weakens intellectual property rights on new meds.
In an interview with The Financial Times following the rejection this month of his bid to protect the patent on the Gleevec cancer med (in other countries sold as Glivec), Vasella says “concrete plans” for investments in research in India stalled during the trial and Novartis will now go elsewhere. Novartis is already expanding in China, despite concerns over corruption and quality control.
Novartis had appealed against an earlier Indian ruling to reject patents on Gleevec. The court argued that “incremental innovation” didn’t qualify it as a new chemical entity justifying protection. The drugmaker says the interpretation violated World Trade Organization agreements and would be a disincentive for investment because much innovation occurs through incremental research.
The case became a rallying point for non-governmental organizations, which mounted a campaign against Novartis to drop the legal action. Campaigners argued that tougher patent rules were undermining India’s pivotal role in providing cheap medicines for the developing world through its low-cost generic drugs industry.
Some HIV/AIDS advocacy groups are calling on Novartis to drop its legal challenge, saying that if the company wins the case it could restrict access to antiretroviral drugs for millions of people worldwide.
Although some Indian drug companies and groups say that Gleevec is a new formulation of a drug developed before 1995, Novartis says that it is an improved drug. Decisions concerning patents on some newer HIV/AIDS drugs in India have not been announced. If Novartis wins the case, it could potentially set a precedent for other pharmaceutical companies seeking patent protection for drugs, including antiretrovirals, some HIV/AIDS advocates have said.
According to Medecins Sans Frontieres, most of the roughly 9,000 pending patent applications would be affected by this ongoing case. MSF, which relies on India for about 80% of the AIDS drugs it uses to provide 80,000 people worldwide with access to treatment, in a statement said that if India is "made to change its law, many of these medicines could become patented, making them off-limits to the generic competition that has proved to bring prices down".
 http://www.pharmalot.com/2007/08/payback-novartis-to-slash-investment-in-india/
http://www.kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=43357
 E-Mail: alfcia_vries@mail2world.com  Website: http://www.novartiskills.eu
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