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Thursday, May 2, 2024
News and Views from the Global South
Bitter Pill: Obstacles to Affordable Medicine
HEALTH: A Phone Call Could Provide HIV/AIDS Treatment
Soon chatting to ones friends or family over a mobile phone could mean that an HIV positive person will receive sustainable antiretroviral treatment (ART) that could prolong their life. That is if civil society in Kenya has its way.HEALTH: Poor States Should Start Campaign to Extend Patent Rights
Pharmaceutical industries in emerging markets are shifting their focus away from poor to developed countries, which will affect access to cheap generic medicines. Poor states should tackle this development by capitalising on the international trade exemptions they still enjoy regarding medicines as "intellectual property".MALAWI: Rural Areas Still Struggle to Access Medicines
In the shade of a leafy mango tree at the rural Chipho Health Centre in Thyolo, southern Malawi, Melifa Faison sits looking frequently down the road hoping to see an ambulance. Lying beside her is her 6-year-old daughter, weak with malaria.HEALTH: Money Needed for ART Funding
Fixed targets for universal access to AIDS treatment and funding to make it achievable are what HIV and AIDS organisations want from the upcoming United Nations General Assembly Special Session due to be held in New York next month.
KENYA: Small Profit Margin Hinders Access to Subsidised Anti-malarial Drugs
On the streets of Nairobi James Odhiambo goes from one pharmacy to the next in search of anti-malarial drugs marked with the Global Fund’s logo of a green leaf. He is looking for this specific brand because he understands that it is more than ten times cheaper than the same drug produced by different manufacturers.
EU Trade Deal with India Stalemated by Threat to Affordable Drugs
More than four years after the EU started negotiating a trade agreement with India, the process has been pushed to a stalemate by the EU’s stubborn insistence in maintaining the so-called data exclusivity clause, despite fierce opposition by Indian government negotiators and Indian and EU non- governmental organisations (NGOs).
INDIA: EU Trade Deal May Curb Affordable Drug Supply
As India prepares to seal a sweeping trade and investment deal with the European Union (EU) in April, civil society groups are campaigning to limit the agreement's repercussions within the local generic drug industry here upon which millions of people around the globe depend.Medicine Alliance Fighting Corruption in Zambia
"I had always associated corruption with politics and business," laments Chalwe Kabwesha. "When I failed to access ARVs and TB drugs at our clinic because of corruption, I got worried."KENYA: Civil Society Defends Access to Generic Drugs
Access to affordable medicine for millions of people in the South could be at risk if the production and distribution of generic medicine from India is restricted.
PAKISTAN: Injecting Disease With Medicine
Once every two weeks, 45-year-old Perween Riaz enters a place with a sign outside that says "Ghazi Medical Centre" where she gets injections for headache and nausea from someone people know is not a real doctor.SOUTH AFRICA: Delayed Drug Registration Could Affect Region
Delays in drug registration by the country's Medicines Control Council (MCC), contribute to depriving South African HIV patients of important fixed dose combination antiretroviral (ARV) drugs. But there are indications that the effects of the delays are being felt even farther afield.HEALTH-PERU: Cost of Medicines Out of Control
When the price of medicines for treating cancer soared by up to 64 percent in 2010, the Peruvian government set up a watchdog commission that will also monitor prices of drugs for diabetes and HIV/AIDS.HEALTH: Battle Against Dengue Finds a New Front
When an outbreak of dengue fever occurred in the hot and humid north of Australia’s Queensland state in late 2008, Nicola Strange was among hundreds of locals that contracted the mosquito-borne disease.SOUTH AFRICA: How Better ARV Prices Were Won
South Africa’s recently-awarded tender for antiretroviral drugs halved drug costs for the world’s largest ARV programme. Driven by a better-prepared and more aggressive government, the deal may stand up to criticism better than initially thought.
CAMBODIA: EU, India Trade Deal Could Hurt Access to Anti-Retrovirals
Every day, twice a day for the last seven years, Men Thol has swallowed a set of pills that gives him the strength to lead a normal life.EL SALVADOR: Political Tug-of-War Over Medicines
Two initiatives of the administration of President Mauricio Funes in El Salvador, aimed at increasing competition in the pharmaceutical industry in order to bring down the cost of medicines, are being fought by the opposition in Congress.Free Trade Threatens Affordable HIV Treatment
With India's role as 'pharmacy to the developing world' seriously threatened by a free trade agreement to be signed with the European Union in December, the fate of cheap or free antiretroviral treatment for people living with HIV and AIDS hangs in balance.HEALTH-UGANDA: Problems with Anti-Counterfeit Bill Persist
Health rights activists still insist that, despite some improvements to Uganda’s controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Bill, it will affect the availability of generic medicine if enacted in present form.HEALTH: S. Africa Becomes a Victim of its ARV Treatment Success
Almost a million South Africans are already on lifelong antiretroviral (ARV) treatment and this number is supposed to triple in the next decade if the South African government keeps to its implementation plan.HEALTH-INDIA: Superbug Boosts Hopes of Rational Drug Use
Howls of protest from doctors and officials in India have followed the naming of the New Delhi Metallo-1 (NDM-1), a gene that can transform infectious bacteria into superbugs that are resistant to the most powerful antibiotics. But other experts hope that the furore on this issue may lead to a rethink on the widespread practice of using medicines indiscriminately.HEALTH-UGANDA: WHO Happy With Counterfeit Bill; Activists Not
The Uganda office of the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the country’s National Drug Authority are satisfied that the new version of the controversial Counterfeit Goods Bill does not threaten the importation and production of generic drugs by conflating them with fake drugs, as the first draft of the bill did. But health rights activists are not convinced.« Previous Page — Next Page »
