The NCD Alliance is a formal alliance of the International Diabetes Federation, The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease, Union for International Cancer Control and the World Heart Federation established on 19 May 2009 “representing the four main NCDs outlined in the World Health Organization’s 2008-2013 Action Plan for NCDs – cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and chronic respiratory disease”. Continue Reading
Krista Cox wrote these notes on September 13, 2011, reporting on the eighth round of negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA). Continue Reading
On July 19, I read a press release that annouced that:
As the UN meets to discuss non-communicable diseases, one area of controversy is the effort by White House trade officials and the European Commissioner for Trade to block any mention in a Political Declaration of the November 14, 2001 WTO Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health.
This note explains why the Doha Declaration was important, and what USTR and DG-Trade are trying to do in the NCD resolution. I will start with a very quick history of the events that led to the 2001 WTO resolution.
Wikileaks has published several cables invovling Chile, a country that signed an FTA with the United States/ When the Chile/US FTA came into effect in 2004, it was the template for a series of subsequent Bush Administration FTA agreements that ramped up IPR protections for pharmacetuicals and copyrights, and it seemed aggressive at the time. Continue Reading
 |
| Michael W. Michalak, former Ambassador to Vietnam, pressured Vietnam on behalf of PhRMA. |
Cables recently published by Wikileaks illustrate the degree to which the U.S. has been engaged in writing laws and training judges and government officials in Vietnam, on a wide range of pharmaceutical and intellectual property issues.
USTR has released its new White Paper on Access to Medicine. Here is the press release. A copy of the White Paper is available here:
Last year the USPTO announced the award of $4 million in fy 2009 grants to advise developing couintries on intellectual property policies. The first set of grants were done under Arti Rai, then Administrator for External Affairs at USTPO. The grants went to a variety on pro-right owner groups, including those associated with Newt Gingrich and the Tea Party, and several supported by firms like Pfizer and Microsoft. Seven of the groups receiving the fy 2009 have in common the fact they received funding from either Microsoft or the Gates Foundation.
Submission of Knowledge Ecology International (KEI) to the WIPO Standing Committee on the Law of Patents (SCP): Patents and Health
11 September 2011
Thiru Balasubramaniam
The United States and the European Union are using a United Nations High Level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) to effectively renegotiate a landmark agreement on intellectual property rights and public health.