Five years ago, parliament unanimously supported Canada’s Access to Medicines Regime (CAMR) with the goal of getting affordable, generic medicines to the developing world.
Last year, Apotex Inc. produced an HIV and AIDS drug, and the first shipment of seven million tablets to treat 21,000 people was shipped to Rwanda. The first use of the law is also likely to be the last.
Due to red tape, licensing is too costly and cumbersome to obtain under the current legislation. Apotex Inc. has stated that although it has the technology and the will to produce and send affordable medicines (including medicines for children with HIV), it is unable to do it again unless the CAMR is changed.
“But now there is a change to fix CAMR” said Sharon Ogden, a member of The Grandmothers on the Grand, which works to support African grandmothers and the millions of AIDS orphans in their care.
In early 2009, Canadian Grandmothers for Africa presented a petition that includes a demand to reform CAMR. Ottawa responded on March 31. Senator Yoine Goldstein, from Montreal, introduced a bill (now sponsored by Senator Sharon Carstairs) which aims to reduce red tape in CAMR by establishing a “one-license-solution.”
The reaction of the brand-name pharmaceutical industry is an intensive lobbying of Senators and urging them to reject the bill.
On May 25, more hope for reform of CAMR came from Judy Wasylycia-Leis, an MP from Winnipeg North, who introduced another bill. It also offers to streamline CAMR in order to get urgently needed drugs to HIV and AIDS patients as soon as possible. With the first hour of debate launched in parliament this past week, momentum and support for the bill is expected to build over the summer leading up to a fall vote.
The Grandmothers on the Grand are urging elected officials to support the measures to reform CAMR.
“Reforming this bill so that Canadian companies can produce and send life-saving medicines will not cost the taxpayer a cent” said Ogden. “But more importantly, it is the right thing to do.”
