Pharmaceutical Industry Tra...

By Peter Maybarduk
Foreign Policy
Letter to the Editor
November/December 2008

Roger Bate (“The Deadly World of Fake Drugs,” September/October 2008) correctly identifies the serious threat to patient safety that substandard counterfeit medicines pose. But one of his prescriptions— that health professionals consider sacrificing broad public access to treatment in favor of purchasing more expensive brand-name drugs—is bad medicine indeed.

Bate, a resident fellow of the American Enterprise Institute, failed to disclose that his organization receives substantial funding from brand-name pharmaceutical companies, including Eli Lilly and Company Foundation, Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, and Pfizer. Bate is also a fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, which employs on its board of trustees a former chairman of SmithKline Beecham and a current member of GlaxoSmithKline’s board of directors.

Brand-name pharmaceutical companies stand to benefit substantially from some of Bate’s proposals. For example, he claims humanitarian groups must choose between “expensive, safe drugs that treat fewer patients, or cheaper drugs that might not work.” This false dichotomy excludes the many affordable generic medicines that have undergone rigorous testing at the World Health Organization and other major drug regulatory authorities.
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The Daily Times (Malawi)

My Point of View -On neo-colonialist NGOs
By Robert Weissman,
07 May 2008

It would be easy to dismiss Temba Nolutshungu's recent opinion -- Neo-colonialist NGOs published in The Daily Times -- if it were not part of an organised effort to spread confusion about vitally important policy debates with life-and-death consequences.

The author spins a fantasy story in which public health groups have wrested control of the World Health Organisation (WHO), and are seeking to undermine the efficient patent-based pharmaceutical research and development (R&D) system.

Perhaps readers might have been able to better understand the motivations for the author’s arguments if he had revealed his organisation's financial entanglements with Big Pharma.

Signers of "Patient Declaration" for WHO talks financially tied to Big Pharma

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 28, 2008

Contact:
Sarah Rimmington, (Geneva) (+41)(0)76-269-2246, srimmington@essentialinformation.org
Robert Weissman, (Washington, DC) (+1) 202-387-8030, rob@essential.org

GENEVA - Most signers of a "Patient Declaration" being circulated in the context of the World Health Organization's (WHO's) talks on R&D for the developing world are financially tied to Big Pharma. That according to a report issued today by Essential Action.

Essential Action's report, “Patients, Patents and the Pharmaceutical Industry,” shows that the organization circulating the declaration, Patients and Patents, is run by individuals financially entangled with the brand-name pharmaceutical industry. The report also shows that most signers of the “Patient Declaration on Medical Innovation and Access,” which is being circulated by Patients and Patents, are tied to the industry.

The Essential Action report is available here.

Most signers of a "Patient Declaration" being circulated in the context of the World Health Organization's (WHO's) talks on R&D for the developing world are financially tied to Big Pharma. That according to a report issued today by Essential Action.

Essential Action's report, “Patients, Patents and the Pharmaceutical Industry,” shows that the organization circulating the declaration, Patients and Patents, is run by individuals financially entangled with the brand-name pharmaceutical industry. The report also shows that most signers of the “Patient Declaration on Medical Innovation and Access,” which is being circulated by Patients and Patents, are tied to the industry.

The Essential Action report in .pdf form or as an .rtf document.

Thailand's ill see benefits from 'compulsory licensing'
Robert Weissman
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
April 4, 2008

The rationale for Sally Pipes' fanciful opinion piece ("Thailand's misuse of `compulsory licensing' allowed corrupt officials to steal millions," March 21) would have been a lot clearer to readers if she had revealed that her think tank is funded by the pharmaceutical industry. Her organization, the Pacific Research Institute, has received more than $1 million from Eli Lilly since 2000. Several members of its board are tied to the industry through investment funds or lobby shops.

Pipes derides Thailand for issuing compulsory licenses on several AIDS, heart disease and cancer drugs. A compulsory license is a lawful government authorization of generic competition for products while they remain on patent.

Untruthfully, Pipes says Thai patients have not seen benefits as a result. In fact, the Thai compulsory licenses have lowered the price of an important HIV/AIDS drug (brand name: Kaletra) by about three-quarters, enabling the government to triple the number of people receiving this life-saving treatment. More will go on the treatment as need grows and generic competition continues to reduce prices. The generic version of a heart-disease drug (brand-name: Plavix) is one-seventieth the cost of the brand-name product, which will enable the government to offer the drug in the public health system. Previously, it has been unavailable.

DenverPost.com
Rationing life-saving medicines in Thailand
By Robert Weissman
04/02/2008

Denver Post readers might reasonably have been confused by Professor Kristina Lybecker's astounding claims in a March 18 online guest commentary ("Compulsory drug licensing disastrous"). Professor Lybecker alleged that Thailand's efforts to lower the price of life-saving medications and make them available to poor people would have a "disastrous effect on public health worldwide."

Readers might have been able to put this remarkable and misguided argument in context if Professor Lybecker had revealed her extensive financial entanglements with Big Pharma.

Stronger Patent Protections Will Take Lives, Not Save Them
Written by Robert Weissman
River Cities' Reader (Iowa)
Wednesday, 19 March 2008

The reason for Peter Pitts' overheated rhetoric in a recent River Cities' Reader guest commentary ("We're Taking Your Medicine, Literally," Issue 674, March 5-11, 2008) would have been a lot clearer if he had disclosed his multiple entanglements with the brand-name pharmaceutical industry.

Mr. Pitts alleged that Thailand, Brazil, and other developing-country governments have stolen patented inventions from brand-name pharmaceutical companies.

What these countries have actually done is issue compulsory licenses - authorizations for generic competition, while products remain on patent - that have enabled sick people to get life-saving medicines they would otherwise be denied.

Here is what Mr. Pitts did not explain.

Compulsory licenses the right medicine for prescriptions in developing countries
By Robert Weissman
Published at South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Ft. Lauderdale/Broward County, Florida)
March 18, 2008


The reason for Peter Pitts' overheated rhetoric in a recent South Florida Sun-Sentinel op-ed ("We're Taking Your Medicine, Literally," March 11) would have been a lot clearer if he had disclosed to readers his multiple entanglements with the brand-name pharmaceutical industry.

Mr. Pitts alleged that Thailand, Brazil and other developing country governments have stolen patented inventions from brand-name pharmaceutical companies. What these countries have actually done is issue compulsory licenses — lawful authorizations for generic competition, while products remain on patent — that have enabled sick people to get lifesaving medicines they would otherwise be denied.

Here is what Mr. Pitts did not explain:

by Robert Weissman
Published at Taipei Times

Jeremiah Norris, the author of a recent article published in your paper, works for the Hudson Institute, which is described in his bio as a think tank ("WHO: Long on agenda, but short on the facts," Nov. 4, page 8). This think tank is funded by pharmaceutical giants including Eli Lilly, Merck, Pfizer and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, and its output regularly reflects the views of its corporate sponsors.

Norris' ill-conceived rant suggests it is health infrastructure, not drug prices, that matters in developing countries.

The reality, however, is that both factors are vital.
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by Kaitlin Mara for Intellectual Property Watch
Published at Intellectual Property Watch

As negotiators gather at the United Nations this week in Geneva to seek ways to boost innovation on neglected diseases disproportionately affecting poor people, a new study was released showing that commentators at the negotiation’s public hearing came primarily from organisations affiliated in some way with the pharmaceutical or biotechnology industries.

The study, released on 7 November, was conducted by US nongovernmental group Essential Action via survey. Commentators registered as an ‘NGO’, ‘Civil Society Group’, or ‘International Organization’ and were asked whether their group accepts donations from for-profit corporations or trade associations, and then asked for details regarding specific companies, amounts donated, and stated purpose of donations. Essential Action also independently researched funding sources and affiliations of
commentators who did not respond to the survey.
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