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Delegates at this May’s World Health Assembly (WHA) supported a resolution to increase WHO’s role in advising countries about best treatment options for HIV/AIDS and ways to reduce barriers affecting drug pricing and access. The approved resolution calls on WHO to expand current databases to include information on the prices of many crucial medicines, including HIV/AIDS drugs. At the WHA, developing countries also encouraged WHO to play an active role in advising countries on the public health implications of international trade agreements.
In the language of the HIV/AIDS resolution and in their own formal remarks, developing country representatives emphasised the need to encourage local manufacturing, greater use of generic drugs and legal import practices in order to bring down prices and improve access to essential medicines.
During a discussion on the Revised Drug Strategy, numerous countries urged WHO to guard its independent voice when giving countries’ advice on health-related aspects of trade after some developed countries led by the US signalled they would support an initiative that would force the WHO to clear any advice on trade issues with other international organisations including the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).
More information about the WHA and HAI’s role there, can be found on HAI’s website: http://www.haiweb.org/news/news.html
The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced a reshuffling of several senior staff members. Dr. Michael Scholtz, formerly executive director of the health technology and pharmaceuticals cluster of the essential drugs and other medicines (EDM) division in Geneva has been appointed Special Representative of the Director General. In this position, he will be “charged primarily to work with the private sector on improved access to relevant drugs and vaccines.”
He will be replaced by Dr. Hiro Suzuki. Suzuki was born in Japan in 1959 and received his Medical Doctor degree from Keio University in 1984. He also has an MPH and MSc from Harvard and a PhD from Keio University. His past positions include Deputy Director of the Division of Ageing and Health in the Ministry of Health of Japan and since July 1998, Executive Director of Social Change and Mental Health at WHO.
In April, HAI and a number of partner NGOs took part in the WHO Health Technology and Pharmaceutical Clusters Meeting for Interested Parties (MIP). The two-day meeting included discussions on the agency’s role in improving access to essential drugs, WHO’s corporate strategic agenda, and the cluster’s budget and workplan for the coming year. HAI raised the issue of the draft guidelines on interaction with commercial enterprises.
In May, members of the Roundtable met in Geneva to address key policy issues including improving access to essential medicines and WHO’s relationship with the private sector and to update their plans on collaborative projects.
NGO participants met with the WHO Director General to discuss WHO’s role on improving access to essential drugs and set out their main priorities. The group also highlighted its concerns about conflict of interest in WHO’s interactions with the private sector, specifically pharmaceutical companies. WHO staff member Denis Aitken explained the organisation’s financial relationship with industry and said that while private sector contributions are a small segment of the WHO’s overall budget currently, it is likely that this amount will increase noticeably in the next ten to fifteen years. He said that the draft guidelines on interaction with commercial enterprises were still being revised and would be made public sometime next year.
During its discussions, the participants updated their plans on two technical projects. A price monitoring project is now planned and should start collecting data shortly. The project will review current methodology used for such monitoring and propose a simple method to carry out this work. The methodology will be field tested and made available to NGOs and others for price monitoring in any country.
Progress has also been made in creating a database on the impact of drug promotion and creating tools to train health professionals to evaluate drug promotion. Efforts are now focusing on making this information available on a website.
