DrewWilson
May 21st, 2009, 02:28 PM
The most favorable explanation for what is going on this week in Geneva is that Hillary Clinton and Obama are not following what key Bush hold-overs are about to do. The less favorable explanation is that Secretaries Clinton (State) and Sebelius (HHS) and the Obama White House are closely working with PhRMA to kill any further discussions of a medical R&D treaty at the WHO.
The medical R&D treaty has been discussed by many governments at the WHO, and supported by a very long list of health, consumer and development NGOs, including MSF, Oxfam, Health Action International, HealthGap, the 80 member TransAtlantic Consumer Dialogue, Knowledge Ecology International, Essential Action, and others. (See earlier expressions of support here, here, here, and here).
At present, the United States government is the leading source of government funded medical R&D, through agencies such as the National Institutes of Health. In both absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP, no other country comes close.
Health groups want more spent on priority medical R&D, particularly in areas such as the development of new antibiotics and vaccines, or treatments for neglected diseases. Given the dominant role of the U.S. in funding medical R&D now, this would largely result in increased obligations for other countries, particularly those with high incomes.
There are is also discussion about possible sharing of the costs of independent clinical trials for the development and evaluation of new medicines, greater transparency of the R&D resource flows and outputs, the use of new incentive systems like innovation inducement prizes that de-link R&D incentives from drug pricing, and many other topics (see below).
More... (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-love/hillary-and-obama-set-to_b_205618.html)
:15:
The medical R&D treaty has been discussed by many governments at the WHO, and supported by a very long list of health, consumer and development NGOs, including MSF, Oxfam, Health Action International, HealthGap, the 80 member TransAtlantic Consumer Dialogue, Knowledge Ecology International, Essential Action, and others. (See earlier expressions of support here, here, here, and here).
At present, the United States government is the leading source of government funded medical R&D, through agencies such as the National Institutes of Health. In both absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP, no other country comes close.
Health groups want more spent on priority medical R&D, particularly in areas such as the development of new antibiotics and vaccines, or treatments for neglected diseases. Given the dominant role of the U.S. in funding medical R&D now, this would largely result in increased obligations for other countries, particularly those with high incomes.
There are is also discussion about possible sharing of the costs of independent clinical trials for the development and evaluation of new medicines, greater transparency of the R&D resource flows and outputs, the use of new incentive systems like innovation inducement prizes that de-link R&D incentives from drug pricing, and many other topics (see below).
More... (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-love/hillary-and-obama-set-to_b_205618.html)
:15: