Big pharma's small-mindedness

It’s one of the great scandals of our times, writes Johann Hari in the Independent. In order to counter the swine flu epidemic, factories in the developing world are desperate to put out generic versions of Tamiflu, but are being told not to. So that “rich drug companies can protect their patents – and profits.”

        
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This, however, is not quite as surprising as the fact that The World Health Organisation (WHO), which has been warning of the ravages of swine flu in the developing world, seems to back Roche, the company that owns the Tamiflu patent. Under global trade laws, patent can be breached in the event of overwhelming health emergency. WHO however has not called for the use of this loophole, leaving Roche with exclusive rights to sell its own expensive branded version.
Big Pharma constantly argues that it needs to charge large sums for drugs in order to develop more life-saving medicines. But a study shows that only 14 per cent of budgets go towards developing drugs. Most research, in fact, is conducted in government-funded university labs. Drug companies only intervene in the largely uncreative final stages. “In returns,” Hari reports, “they then own exclusive rights to manufacture and profit from the resulting medicine for years.”
Side effects
Is Tamiflu suitable for children?
A headline on the front page of Belgian dailyLe Soirasks, "Should we worry about the swine flu drug?" In the absence of a vaccine and because it is the only available treatment against the H1N1 virus, Tamiflu is extremely popular. But like all medicines, it can cause side effects. The Belgian daily reports that "a study conducted by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has revealed that a large number of schoolchildren in the southwest of England reported significant side effects following the distribution of preventive doses of Tamiflu." Feelings of fatigue, difficulties concentrating, vomiting, and diarrhoea, were among the unwanted effects of the drug. Anne Malfroot, the head of the department for infectious diseases in a Brussels hospital interviewed byLe Soir, is concerned about the massive use of preventive doses of the antiviral. Until more is known about the effects of Tamiflu on younger age groups, she takes the view that "it should not be given to healthy children."