WHAT鈥橲 GOT into Big Pharma? A few months ago leading drugs companies were
threatening to sue the South African government over its plans to import cheap
copies of patented AIDS drugs. Then, suddenly, they backed down and said they
would supply the same drugs to poor countries at discounted rates. Now they are
about to give the poor world cheap tuberculosis drugs
(see 鈥淟ives before profit鈥�).
Cynics might sniff a PR exercise. But it would be churlish not to welcome the
news. Tuberculosis is a nasty illness that already claims between 2 and 3
million lives a year and shows every sign of spiralling out of control. The
microbe is even making a comeback in cities like London as people migrate there
from TB hot spots. Anything that helps has got to be a step in the right
direction.
It鈥檚 just that in this case the step is small and doesn鈥檛 get to the heart of
the problem. The TB drugs being discounted are the expensive 鈥渟econd line鈥�
antibiotics used to treat drug-resistant strains. The vast majority of patients
have bog-standard TB. At $10 for a six-month course, the four very old
antibiotics needed to cure these infections are already about as cheap as drugs
ever get鈥攁nd yet millions still die every year.
Advertisement
The people who need the drugs are either not getting them or finding them too
cumbersome to take. Anyone unclear about why should go to sub-Saharan Africa and
try swallowing a cocktail of 10 tablets a day on a near-empty stomach for six
months without access to clean drinking water let alone a nurse. Some countries,
notably Peru and Vietnam, have summoned up the will and know-how to make the
treatments work. But simpler TB drugs that act more quickly are urgently needed.
These are what the world isn鈥檛 getting. Promising new compounds sit on shelves
because companies are reluctant to invest big money on drugs for patients who
cannot afford to pay much.
The apathetic rich governments of the West and their taxpayers bear much of
the blame. What we need are, first, international rules to force companies to
hand over to non-profit organisations any potential drugs they do not wish to
develop. And, second, a swift, joined-up effort from drugs firms, governments
and the WHO to produce new TB drugs before the pandemic escalates
(see 鈥淐oming home鈥�).
It鈥檚 an approach that can work. Drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline developed a
combination treatment for malaria called lapdap in a $3 million programme
jointly funded by the British government and the WHO. The company has already
agreed to supply it for as little as 50 cents per treatment.
Politicians who doubt there are votes in this issue are wrong. As goods,
capital and businesses move ever more easily through an increasingly borderless
and globalised world, people are noticing that when it comes to life-saving
drugs, one border is still in place鈥攂etween the haves and the have-nots.
That鈥檚 one reason people took to the streets in Seattle, Prague and Gothenburg.
And why they鈥檒l be out again in Genoa when the G8 nations meet there this
month.
