Brant, Jennifer

Poor-quality medicines pose a serious threat to patients and public health in developing countries. The World Health Organisation estimates nearly one-third of all countries lack adequate drug-regulatory capacity to monitor medicines safety. Under the guise of addressing this problem, some rich countries are pushing for new intellectual-property rules and a reliance on police action to […]

As a result of unfair trade rules and falling commodity prices, Africa has suffered terms-of-trade losses and increasing marginalisation. Ten years after the Uruguay Round, the poorest continent on earth, which captures only one per cent of world trade, risks even further losses, despite promises of a ‘development round’ of trade negotiations. This would be […]

Impressive advances in medicine and technology have boosted health and extended life expectancy – but not for everyone. Vital new medicines for diseases such as HIV/AIDS are priced out of reach of the millions of sick people in the developing world, in part due to global patent rules which restrict the availability of affordable generic […]