BY SEAN HEALY

United States negotiators have taken a hard line in defence of drug companies' patents in a special one-day meeting of the World Trade Organisation on June 20, stating that it would oppose any attempt to weaken the WTO's agreement on trade-related intellectual property rights.

The meeting was called to clarify how the controversial TRIPS agreement could be altered to ease restrictions on the production of generic drugs, which cost a tiny fraction of brand-name drugs but which typically breach the patent rights of rich Western pharmaceutical companies.

In one of the most controversial such cases, US drug companies are attempting to prevent the government of Brazil from distributing cheap, generic versions of anti-AIDS drugs they hold the patents on. Brand-name drugs which cost US$1000 a month in the US cost only US$78 in Brazil when produced generically.

While poor countries argued that a relaxation of the agreement would help them save the lives of some of the millions of AIDS sufferers around the world, the rich countries, led by the US, held firm, warning that they would not allow the weakening of patent rules to undermine companies' profitability.

“Without the economic incentives provided by patent systems, there would be far fewer drugs available for the treatment ... of life-threatening disease”, US trade official Claude Burcky told the meeting.

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