Thailand threatens to override more patents

The Straits Times, February 20, 2007


After issuing licence for generic Aids drug, it wants price cuts on other medicines

BANGKOK - THAILAND will likely override international patents on more drugs, including those for cancer and heart disease, if pharmaceutical giants do not significantly cut their prices.

'We have thought about this for more than five years. It's long enough,' said Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla, who is leading one of the biggest challenges to pharmaceutical giants' patent rights in years.

He said price talks with major drug firms had become 'easier' since Bangkok issued compulsory licences allowing generic drug production on two HIV/Aids drugs and a medicine for heart disease, the first time a developing nation has done so for such a treatment.

'If they reduce their drug price to our satisfaction, there is no need to make a compulsory licence,' Mr Mongkol said in an interview.

But he said it was too late for drug giant Merck, which had a licence issued against its HIV/Aids drug Efavirenz in November and which last week slashed the price in Thailand by nearly half to 700 baht (S$32) per patient per month.

The first 16,000 bottles of generic Efavirenz from Indian drug maker Ranbaxy Laboratories, part of a contract for 66,000 bottles, arrived in Thailand this month, Mr Mongkol said.

Although legal under world trade rules, the licences, which allow Thailand's military-appointed government to make or buy copycat versions of medicines needed for public-health measures, stunned the drug-maker, which received no warning.

Mr Mongkol did not give a number, but he said other 'essential medicines' to fight cancer, heart disease and other leading causes of death in Thailand were being studied.

Most of Thailand's 63 million people cannot afford patented drugs, he said, and the licences issued so far are expected to save the government up to $24 million a year.

While he has faced strong criticism outside the country - the Wall Street Journal wrote an editorial last week on what it called the 'Theft in Thailand' - Mr Mongkol's ministry scored the highest in a Thai poll on the government's performance.

REUTERS