The Hill: Don’t forget consumers and patients in the Trans-Pacific Partnership
Nancy LeaMond, AARP’s chief advocacy and engagement officer, and Sophie Delaunay, executive director of Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), USA

“…Today, AARP and Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) express our deep concerns about the TPP’s impact on drug prices. Intellectual property provisions being proposed by the U.S. put too much emphasis on drug industry priorities at the expense of consumer and patient needs. … In its current form, the TPP could negatively affect the health and lives of millions of people who rely on access to affordable medicines, and fundamentally contradicts and undermines the U.S. government’s own commitments and investments in both domestic and global health. Global health programs supported by U.S. taxpayers like the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria all heavily rely on the availability of price-lowering competition in medicines and vaccines to effectively run their programs…” (4/27).