Transcript Eastern Europe & Central Asia

Eastern Europe & Central Asia
IP/ Trade developments & civil society
Olena, All-Ukrainian Network of PLHIV
Denis, ITPCru
Raminta, EATG / OSF
Civil Society Sstrategy Meeting on the Future of Access to
Medicines, BKK, 13-15 Dec 2011
• 12+3 countries of different sizes and shapes
• Middle income, few low income
• Proximity to the EU
• Influence of patternalistic Russia
Increasing IP & data exclusivity
protection
• WTO/FTA/EU accession
– (Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, ...)
– But national legislation goes even for higher protection (recent
Ukraine Law on Medicines: higher data exclusivity protections than required via its
agreements with WTO and EU)
• Regional
• Eurasian Patent Organization: gateway to register regional
patents
• Customs union – impact to be reviewed
• Some flexibilities remain (competition law, CL/Gvt use..)
• Little understanding of the issues
– Community (exceptions: Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, 2-3 regional people – key success of the
last 3 years)
– Govnts (some more knowledge through regional UNDP
workshops)
– UNDP national offices..
Major problems with A2M?
• Local pharmaceutical industry – strategic priority (Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan)
• National budgets for meds increase but access 40-60%
• Quality
– Probably some real problems / low quality standards at regulatory
level and corruption, particularly for domestic production
– All patient communities: generics are not good (we want European
standard)
• Corruption in tenders & registration:
– Russia pays higher prices for hepC, some ARV meds than in the EU;
only six generic ARV registered/3 purchased
– Ukraine: major HIV network’s efforts to increase transparency of
procurement
• Enforcing patents: more activity and interest from big pharma
• HIV: Merck,GSK, Abbott/Ukraine..
• Key issue - transparency
Community advocacy in A2M in 20092011
• Hepatitis C Tx advocacy
– National commitment
– Community organizing
• IP
– Kyrgyzstan: Patent Law review, community organizing,
mobilizing UNDP support
– First attempts to influence FTA/WTO negotiations: KZ,
Ukr
– Advocacy around data exclusivity in Ukraine
• HIV: Reactive advocacy re ART access
– Interruptions, tender monitoring