Since late 2019, Lebanon has been grappling with its worst economic crisis in decades, social unrest and political turmoil. On top of that, and following the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic at the start of 2020, a major explosion tore through the capital, Beirut, in August. These overlapping crises have exacerbated people’s vulnerability and pushed thousands into poverty. All this … Read more
Terms of a deal disclosed show that we cannot rely on pharma’s goodwill to do the right thing, even in a pandemic. Geneva, 11 November 2020 – After the worrying terms of a deal struck between pharmaceutical corporation AstraZeneca and Brazilian public research body Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (Fiocruz) were disclosed recently, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans … Read more
Governments make request to WTO for intellectual property waiver for all countries until herd immunity reached Geneva – In a landmark move, India and South Africa on 2 October asked the World Trade Organization (WTO) to allow all countries to choose to neither grant nor enforce patents and other intellectual property (IP) related to COVID-19 … Read more
Stobdan Kalon is a medical doctor working with Medecins Sans Frontieres/Doctors Without Borders (MSF). His experience spans from managing infectious diseases, interventions in Drug Resistant-Tuberculosis (DR-TB), hepatitis and HIV. As a doctor, I am elated that the World Health Organization (WHO) has updated their DR-TB treatment guidelines, which approves concomitant use of Bedaquiline and Delamanid … Read more
New Delhi, India: Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) has welcomed the revision made by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to its tuberculosis (TB) guidelines, allowing for safe use of a treatment regimen including both bedaquiline and delamanid for drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) patients, while urging a faster uptake in India for patients with extensively drug-resistant … Read more
NEW YORK/GENEVA – The pharmaceutical corporation Johnson & Johnson (J&J) has announced a reduced price of US$1.50 [1] per day for the tuberculosis (TB) drug bedaquiline, which is an important step that should allow more people with drug-resistant forms of TB (DR-TB) to access this lifesaving drug. But the price should come down further and be … Read more
NEW YORK/NEW DELHI —Amidst the ongoing global crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) released its annual “Special 301 Report” today that calls out countries for implementing and supporting public health safeguards in their intellectual property laws and policies. The US government uses this report to annually target countries it believes are … Read more
GENEVA/NEW YORK — Doctors Without Borders / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has called for no patents or profiteering on drugs, tests, or vaccines used for the COVID-19 pandemic, and for governments to prepare to suspend and override patents and take other measures, such as price controls, to ensure availability, reduce prices and save more lives. Already, Canada, … Read more
Mumbai (India) – As of February 2020, the MSF private clinic in Govandi, Mumbai has initiated 188 drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) patients on treatment regimen which includes Bedaquiline and Delamanid. Globally, an estimated 10 million people fell ill with tuberculosis (TB) in 2018 with India bearing the largest share of global TB burden (27%) much more than … Read more
In a letter to the United States Trade Representative (USTR) on 6th February 2020, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)/Doctors Without Borders submitted comments to the review process of USTR’s 2020 Special 301 Report and raised concerns of the public health impact of this practice. USTR had called for comments from stakeholders for their 2020 Special 301 Report. … Read more