EU bids to step up fight against disease in poorest countries

Date: 29/06/2000

By Renée Cordes

The European Commission is set to call for wide-ranging measures to prevent the spread of life-threatening diseases in the world's poorest countries.

The move is designed to signal the Union's determination to step up the fight against infectious illnesses ahead of a meeting of the world's most industrialised nations which will discuss the problem later this month.

In a report due to be discussed by the full Commission next Wednesday (5 July), development chief Poul Nielson will set out the case for launching an EU-wide drive to improve health care in less developed countries.

Nielson's approach is expected to be warmly endorsed by his colleagues, who are considering a range of options for combating the problem. Research Commissioner Philippe Busquin is, for example, already exploring ways of increasing EU funding for research into 'essential' drugs which are desperately needed in impoverished nations.

Nielson will seek to refocus the debate on the larger picture of prevention and away from the long-running dispute between non-governmental groups (NGOs) and drug manufacturers over intellectual property rights for essential medicines.

Next week's Commission discussions, which will lay the groundwork for a formal legislative proposal expected in the autumn, comes just two weeks before the Group of Eight industrialised nations are due to discuss the issue in Japan. Although the Commission will only have observer status at the meeting, it hopes that a strong message from the Union will set the tone for an ambitious international agenda.

"A number of issues will be addressed covering the need to strengthen the health sector in general in developing countries," said a Commission official, adding that the main emphasis should be on prevention rather than treatment of symptoms. "It is not just a question of getting the right drugs to the right people."

Pressure is mounting on the world's richest nations to stem the spread of HIV and malaria, which together are responsible for more than 10,000 deaths a day in Africa. Malaria remains the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa and the number of cases has risen by about 40% in the last 25 years.

Some drug companies have already offered to respond to the crises by selling their products at below-market prices in developing countries. But critics argue that if these prices are not set low enough for impoverished citizens to buy them, this could cause greater harm because people might take those drugs in substantially lower doses than required.

The Commission move comes as the world's largest pharmaceutical makers remain embroiled in a battle with NGOs over proposed changes to the World Trade Organisation's intellectual property rules. Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy has already met with the heads of leading drug firms to discuss the issue.

Under the existing TRIPs accord, which governs trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights, governments can cancel companies' patents on drugs in special circumstances to respond to health crises through a system known as compulsory licensing.

The EU executive called last autumn for that right to be extended to more than 300 drugs listed by the World Health Organisation as essential. But drug firms argue that this might do little good as many developing countries lack the distribution infrastructure needed to get drugs to the people who need them.

At a meeting with Lamy this week, representatives from global health-care charity Medecins Sans Frontières urged the Commissioner actively to encourage competition from local manufacturers making generic versions of pharmaceutical products and to encourage voluntary licensing and technology transfer.

The European Commission is set to call for wide-ranging measures to prevent the spread of life-threatening diseases in the world's poorest countries.