-The Hindu Differences over intellectual property rights (IPRs) have emerged as a strong undercurrent in India's economic relations with the U.S. The attempt by the influential pharmaceutical lobby to stymie India's efforts to ensure the supply of medicines at affordable rates without violating existing treaty commitments, requires a principled response from New Delhi. At the core of the issue is what Columbia University Professor Arvind Panagariya calls "the hijacking of...

-IPS News THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Balakrishnan, a labourer from Kochi in the southern Indian state of Kerala, was suffering from oral cancer. He was admitted to the Regional Cancer Centre (RCC) in Thiruvananthapuram. After the first course of radiation therapy, the 60-year-old could not eat or drink because of severe pain and infection in the mouth. An Ayurvedic mouth wash developed from the Neem plant was administered to Balakrishnan for three weeks during the...

-IPS News PESHAWAR, Pakistan- They are contraband, yet a large number of Pakistanis have come to depend on drugs made in India and smuggled into Pakistan. Patients as well as doctors say these are cheap and effective, even as law enforcers look the other way. The two countries do not have a trade agreement on drugs, but markets in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in the north of Pakistan do brisk business in India-made...

-The Business Standard The recent US-India friction over trade is being driven by Big Pharma Apart from the deterioration of the business environment generally, which impacts both domestic and foreign investors, retrospective taxation has figured most prominently in the media as the principal cause of growing scepticism among foreign investors. Entirely missing from the discourse has been an equally potent factor with wholly foreign origins: the hijacking of the economic policy...

-The Indian Express India's role in pharmaceutical patent wars has broadened access to healthcare. Recently, there were rumours that the United States Trade Representative (USTR) was getting ready to announce "trade enforcement actions" or sanctions against India over its intellectual property rights regime. The Obama administration has been under pressure from the US Chamber of Commerce and lobby groups, like the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, to take a tough stance...