USTR urged not to demand excessive IP enforcement in India

Highlighting India's important role in manufacturing lifesaving medicines, an international medical humanitarian organisation today urged the US Trade Representative (USTR) to refrain from demanding excessive IP enforcement measures in India that undermine public health.
In its submission to USTR's Special 301 Review, Medecins Sans Frontires/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said the important role that India plays in manufacturing lifesaving medicines is possible in part due to the public health safeguards in India's patent law and policies.
Thanks to price-lowering competition from India, millions of people around the world are able to access the affordable medicines and vaccines they need, including through Ministries of Health, humanitarian treatment providers like MSF and US government-funded treatment and prevention programs, like the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, it said.

"We urge the USTR to respect legal safeguards such as India's strict patentability criteria; its right to issue compulsory licenses when deemed necessary in the interest of ensuring the right to health; and a balanced approach in the enforcement of private IP (intellectual property) protections," MSF said.
Additionally, pharmaceutical corporations' TRIPS-plus demands such as data exclusivity that go beyond the WTO TRIPS obligations and create regulatory barriers in the registration of price-lowering generic medicines should not be requested to be implemented by India, MSF asserted.
"We specifically request that USTR refrain from demanding any excessive IP enforcement measures in India that undermine public health and Article 21 (right to life) of the Constitution of India and that interfere with judicial discretion," MSF said.

The multinational pharmaceutical industry is increasingly demanding that India's judiciary implements IP enforcement measures in a manner that goes beyond the requirement of the TRIPS Agreement and that include mandatory and stricter injunctions and patent-registration linkage, it noted.

"These demands would have a range of harmful effects on the registration and dissemination of generic medicines and provide opportunity for abuse from multinationals," it warned.
USTR is expected to come out with its report in April.
MSF said countries should not be penalised or discouraged from making use of the public health safeguards that are intended to protect access to medicines and which are legally permitted in accordance with international trade rules.