Health 
Pretoria drug trial postponed for new evidence 

afrol.com, 7 March - The Pretoria court case against the South African government, initiated by 41 drug companies to halt a law opening for the import of cheap copies of brand name medicine, has been adjourned until 18 April. This will allow an unexpected testimony by country's leading AIDS pressure group, Treatment Action Campaign (TAC). 

The TAC will give evidence showing that drug companies abuse their patents in the way they price medicines in different markets and demonstrating the misery caused by AIDS in the developing world. "For the first time, the pharmaceutical industry will have to justify to South Africa and the world why their drug prices are so high and why their patents should be so aggressively protected when millions of people are dying and cheaper drugs exist," TAC chairman Zackie Achmat, who is himself HIV-infected, today said.

South African and international organizations today welcomed the South African High Court's decision to accept evidence from TAC. Their testimony will show "how brand name medicines are unaffordable for millions of people living with HIV in South Africa," the organisations claimed.

The decision to adjourn the case follows a week of worldwide demonstrations in support of the South African government, and calling on companies to drop the case. Thousands of people from trade unions, churches, organisations and people living with HIV/AIDS took to the streets in Pretoria, Cape Town, and Durban. "We thank the efforts of our members whose voices have ensured that the courts have understood the importance of this matter," said Joyce Pekane, Deputy President of the trade union COSATU.

International and national organizations however condemned the pharmaceutical industry for first trying to block TAC's application, and for then requesting a further four months to reply to the application. "The pharmaceutical companies have already delayed this case for three years. Every day's delay means no affordable medicines and more people dying," said Dr Eric Goemaere, Head of Mission for Médécins Sans Frontieres' programs in South Africa. 

The judge acknowledged that this case was of vital importance to people in South Africa and around the world and only granted industry three weeks to respond to TAC's application. The court case will resume from 18 to 26 April 2001.

Meanwhile, in Kenya the government is preparing for a parallel law to allow the cheap import of generic medicine as soon as possible. Kenyan Health Minister Sam Ongeri yesterday said this move was absolutely necessary to afford the treatment of HIV/AIDS patients. "It's going to take 12bn Kenya shillings to treat Aids patients alone, whereas the budget of the Ministry of Health is only 9bn. Therefore we must look for cheaper alternatives," he said. 

An Indian company has offered African countries to import generic AIDS drugs for one tenth of the price for brand name medicines, an offer difficult to accept while the pharmaceutical multinationals aggressively claim their intellectual property rights. World trade regulations do however allow for radical steps in cases of national emergency. In Kenya, 500 people die of AIDS-related diseases each day, enough to call it a "national emergency" the government and organisations figure.

The Pretoria drug trial is followed carefully in most African countries, where parallel legislation could become the result. There is general support for the South African claim that medicine prices are too high to be affordable to the poor. "Millions of poor people die every year from infectious diseases because the medicines that could cure them are too expensive," Médécins Sans Frontieres say.

Source: Based on COSATU, MSF, BBC and afrol archives  

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