[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 63 (Thursday, May 16, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S4487]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    NOVERMBER 2001 DOHA DECLARATION

  MR. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I was unable to deliver this statement 
during the debate on this amendment Tuesday. However, I want to covey 
my strong support for the amendment that was offered by my colleagues 
from Massachusetts and California recognizing the November 2001 Doha 
Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health. I am pleased that 
this amendment was adopted and included in this trade package.
  I supported this amendment because I believe that the Declaration and 
the amendment, properly reaffirm the commitment of the United States 
and of all WTO members to the need to maintain strong global standards 
for intellectual property protection while underscoring that measure 
necessary to meet genuine public health emergencies in poor countries 
can and must be pursued within the TRIPS framework. Solving the problem 
of access to HIV/AIDS medicines lies in overcoming economic and social 
barriers to distribution and effective treatment. Undermining 
intellectual property protection is not part of the solution and will, 
indeed, only aggravate an already progress towards better treatment 
and, ultimately, a cure. Indeed as was documented in the October 17, 
2001 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, in the 
sub-Saharan countries ravaged by AIDS there are very few if any patents 
on the books for HIV/AIDS medicines. The authors of this exhaustive 
study concluded that ``[T]he data suggest that patents in Africa have 
generally not been a factor in either pharmaceutical economics or 
antiretroviral drug treatment access.''
  If I thought that this amendment's intenent was to contribute to the 
campaign to distort the meaning of the Doha Declaration and erode 
essential TRIPS protections, I would have opposed it. However, I have 
been assured that this was not the sponsors' intent, nor the effect of 
its terms, and I therefore support it.

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