TAC Press Release, 5 February 2000: Response to US complaint against Brazil 
at WTO

DROP WTO ACTION NOW!

PROTEST AGAINST US BULLYING: JOIN THE GLOBAL DAY OF ACTION ON 5 MARCH
AGAINST DRUG COMPANY PROFITEERING!

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) supports the demand by hundreds of
Brazilian organisations that the US government drop its complaint against
Brazil at the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

The US complaint claims that Brazil's new patent legislation violates the
Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, by
allowing the Brazilian government to issue compulsory licenses. The
complaint is an attempt by the United States government to destroy Brazil's
generic pharmaceutical industry. This industry has significantly reduced
medicine prices and saved the lives of thousands of people in Brazil with
HIV/AIDS.

Brazil produced these generic anti-retroviral medicines without using
compulsory licenses because pharmaceutical patents were not recognised.
However, in 1997 new legislation was effected which brought Brazil in line
with its WTO TRIPS obligations. In order to produce new generic
anti-retrovirals, the Brazilian government will have to issue compulsory
licenses under this new legislation, which the US is now challenging.

This callous action by the US government threatens the lives of millions of
people living with HIV/AIDS. It will not only hamper access to medicines for
Brazil's 500,000 people with HIV, but also many third-world countries who
are hoping to import Brazil's cheap medicines and to accept Brazil's offer
of knowledge transfer.

The complaint is unlikely to be successful because the TRIPS agreement
allows for compulsory licensing and parallel imports.  These are measures
often used by the United States government itself. Clearly this is an
attempt by the United States government to intimidate Brazil and other poor
countries attempting to break their dependency on multi-national
pharmaceutical companies.

The complaint protects the interests of the multi-national pharmaceutical
industry and their exorbitant profits alone.  It is not even in the interest
of most people in the USA, who pay extremely high prices for pharmaceutical
products.  TAC demands that the USA immediately drops the complaint.

Millions of lives are at stake in this case. TAC also asks WTO Director, Mr.
Mike Moore to immediately convene the dispute settlement body of the WTO and
to rule in line with TRIPS that any country is allowed to use compulsory
licensing for products under patent to protect public health and nutrition.
Failure to do this will demonstrate that the WTO simply defends the interest
of the USA and multinational companies.

TAC demands that the South African Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Health and
Trade and Industry issue a joint statement to defend Brazil.

TAC has called for a global day of action on the 5th March 2001 to denounce
pharmaceutical company profiteering at the expense of the lives of people
with HIV/AIDS and to express support for legislation introduced by the South
African government to allow parallel imports of medicines. In light of the
US complaint at the WTO, we are now also calling for our global allies to
defend Brazil  and demand that the complaint be dropped.

TAC will mobilise broad support for Brazil. For a copy of a TAC Fact Sheet
on the Brazilian HIV/AIDS medicines programme contact info@tac.org.za, or
download it from http://www.tac.org.za/archive.htm