With international drug majors playing down expectations of a voluntary slash in the prices of their research-based AIDS medicines for South Africa, a country besieged by the dreaded HIV virus, pharma company Cipla still stands a chance of exporting AIDS drugs to that country.
The international media had reported some days back that leading drug majors such as Glaxo Wellcome, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck and F Hoffman-La Roche, had decided to slash AIDS drug prices for South Africa by as much as 80 per cent after discussions with the United Nations. The condition was that the South African government would not impose compulsory licensing on these majors and won't import or grant a license to other companies to manufacture cheaper versions of these drugs.
This would have jeopardised Cipla's chance to export AIDS drugs to that country as it was banking on the South African government relaxing patent laws, given the gravity of the AIDS situation.
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The AIDS epidemic there has reached epic proportions with some reports stating that 26 per cent of the babies are being born with the virus.
Leading English weekly Sunday Times said this week that major global manufacturers of AIDS drugs had made no decision on pricing. The report quoted the spokesperson of Glaxo Wellcome as saying it was illegal to collude on pricing levels and the blanket 80 per cent cut in drug prices was misreporting.
Cipla director Amar Lulla said, "We have applied for compulsory licensing and we will pursue this further. There are two ways of going about it _ we either get a license from the originator (of the drug) or we apply to the government to revoke the patent in public interest. But there is no time-frame as to when this can come through. Efforts are on."
Cipla plans to export lamivudine, stavudine, zidovudine, and nevirapine at prices that would be one-fifth to one-tenth of the prices charged by the patent holders. The intention is to export the drug mostly to non-governmental organisations such as Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Frontiers). Lulla said there may be some developments on this front after the Durban conference in July, where various companies in the anti-AIDS segment would meet to discuss these issues.