Patent Protection Crucial for Next Generation of HIV/AIDS Medicines

Main Category: HIV / AIDS
Article Date: 14 Jul 2004 - 2:00 PDT

email to a friend   printer friendly   opinions  

New innovative medicines for people living with HIV/AIDS will be the key to sustain the fight against the pandemic.

Intellectual property protection is essential to ensure the continued development of new HIV/AIDS medicines. In a presentation before the XV International AIDS Conference, Pfizer Inc Chairman and CEO, Henry A. McKinnell, Ph.D., pointed out the critical need for new therapies, particularly to address the issues of resistance and tolerability to existing medicines. Scientific research has shown that within a few years of starting first line antiretroviral treatment, in approximately half of the patients the medicines fail, frequently as a result of drug resistance or tolerability.

The data further indicates that within two years of starting third line antiretroviral therapy, two thirds of patients will experience resistance build up to these medicines.

"The research-based pharmaceutical industry has been quick to discover and develop new medicines to treat HIV and its complications. In the past, governments, NGOs, and the private sector were slow to offer realistic solutions to the multiple challenges of making these medicines available to those people who need them," said McKinnell.

"Since the last Conference in Barcelona, however, there has been a sea change in access initiatives. These include a steep decline in anti-retroviral prices in the poorest countries, and new models of access such as no profit pricing, donations of medicines, voluntary licensing, and increased generic availability."

"The issue of IP is loaded with emotion because it has become a proxy to rationalize reasons for health disparities and economic inequalities. In a world where most AIDS patients die out of sight of even a paved road, patent protection alone is too simplistic an answer," said McKinnell.

"While IP must not be a barrier to treatment, it is a vital resource to help us find new treatments and cures," McKinnell stated. "People living with HIV are going to need a steady stream of new therapies as the virus mutates and currently available treatments fail patients," he added.

"We will work with governments on access to Pfizer medicines needed in the fight against HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis for those who cannot afford treatment. We will not agree, however, where the goal is to appropriate our technology for sale by others at a profit," McKinnell said.

http://www.pfizer.com/are/news_releases

• Additional
• References
• Citations