5-5 | Manila, Philippines is set to host the 18th round of the multilateral trade deal - the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) that encompasses 50% of the global population. With the Philippines holding the chairmanship of ASEAN for 2017, it can be an opportune time for Philippines to take the lead in ensuring that market gains will not trump the right of millions of people to access affordable medicines.
3-23 | Companies and countries must take urgent action to increase access to these life-saving treatments Only 4,800 people with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) in 2016 were treated with two newer and much more effective medicines, even though these have now been on the market for up to four years, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) deplored on 23 March. Outside of a small number of clinical trials and compassionate use programmes, just 469 people received delamanid in 2016, while just over 4,300 received bedaquiline.
3-23 | Companies and countries must take urgent action to increase access to these life-saving treatments Only 4,800 people with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) in 2016 were treated with two newer and much more effective medicines, even though these have now been on the market for up to four years, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) deplored on 23 March. Outside of a small number of clinical trials and compassionate use programmes, just 469 people received delamanid in 2016, while just over 4,300 received bedaquiline.
2-3 | After Phuong was diagnosed with Hepatitis C by a doctor in Vietnam, she was given some vitamins for her liver. Accompanying the pills was the advice that nothing much more could be done for her in there or in her native Cambodia. That was five years ago.
12-5 | As negotiators from the 16 countries in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) meet in Tangerang, Indonesia, starting today, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), along with other health groups, reiterated concerns about harmful intellectual property provisions in the proposed agreement that would increase market monopolies for pharmaceutical corporations and delay or block access to affordable generic medicines. With ratification and implementation of the highly controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement increasingly in doubt,