May
The Cheaper Medicines Bill was finally ratified by Philippine Senators and Congressmen two days ago. The Cheaper Medicines Bill might save millions of Filipino lives because it aims to lower the cost of medicines, which have skyrocketed for the past 5 years, based on research.
The law, officially the “Universally Accessible Cheaper and Quality Medicines Act of 2008,” will be transmitted to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo for signing.
The law seeks to:
• prohibit the grant of new patents based only on newly-discovered uses of a known drug substance;
• allow local generics firms to test, produce and register their generic versions of patented drugs, so these can be sold right upon patent expiry (”early working principle”);
• allow the government use of patented drugs when the public interest is at stake;
• give the President the power to price ceilings on various drugs, upon the recommendation of the Secretary of Health. These drugs include those for chronic illnesses, for prevention of diseases, and those in the Philippine National Drug Formulary (PNDF) Essential Drug List;
• strengthen the BFAD so that it could ensure the safety of medicines, by allowing it to retain its revenues for upgrading of its facilities, equipment and human resources; and
• ensure the availability of affordable medicines by requiring drug outlets to carry a variety of brands for each drug, including those sourced from “parallel importation,” to give the consumer more choices.
Not all congressmen were happy with the development, saying the ratified version was “watered down” following the removal of the drug price regulatory board and the generics-only provisions – two provisions that had been the subject of arguments in the past.
“How do we ensure that branded medicines will be made cheaper? Take a look at the law six months from now. In the end I will be proven right,” House Minority Leader Ronaldo Zamora said.
Senators, led by Mar Roxas III and Pia Cayetano, earlier clashed with congressmen over the deletion of the said provisions.
Roxas, principal author of the Senate version of the bill and co-chairman of the bicameral conference committee, said he was happy that “at last, it’s done, but the work isn’t over.”
He said that with the passage of the medicines law, its proponents must continue to work together to ensure that it is properly implemented by the DOH and Office of the President.
“Our next steps are to call for an Affordable Medicines Summit with all sectors represented so that a concrete implementation plan can be forged, and secondly, we need to convene and activate a congressional oversight committee to make sure that the good intentions of this new law are indeed carried out,” he said.
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Tags: Cheaper Medicines Bill, health, Philippines
