The European Commission is currently discussing complex trade agreements that will decide whether hundreds of thousands of people throughout the world will have access to affordable medicines.
UK MEPs will be asked to vote on whether to accept or reject these agreements.
The discussion may sound dull, but a few short clauses in one agreement with India and another with mainly developed countries seek to impose stricter restrictions on manufacturers and suppliers of generic drugs.
If MEPs agree to these measures, the future supply of millions of cheap medicines for patients in poor countries will be limited and many could die for want of affordable drugs.
As part of our EU Hands Off Our Medicines campaign, the medical organisation Médecins Sans Frontières has written to MEPs asking them to reject these clauses. Just 10 of the UK’s 72 MEPs have responded.
Your readers may wish to contact their MEPs Marta Andreasen, Richard James Ashworth, Sharon Bowles, Nirj Deva, James Elles, Nigel Farage, Daniel Hannan, Peter Skinner, and Keith Taylor, reminding them that a Yes to the clauses will restrict the supply of affordable life-saving medicines to poor people in poor countries.
The generic medicines that these changes threaten will affect availability to antiretroviral treatment in developing countries that can be life-saving.
Please visit msf.org.uk to find out more about the campaign and to sign the campaign letter we are asking your MEPs to sign.
Marc DuBois, General Director, Médecins Sans Frontières UK, London
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