NDP worried ahead of vote on bill to get AIDS medicines overseas

New Democrat Helene Laverdiere is worried partisan politics will get in the way of her House of Commons colleagues “doing the right thing.”

What’s concerning her is Wednesday night’s vote on a private member’s bill – one intended to help Canada send desperately needed medications overseas to people suffering from HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.

Laverdiere, who has a long history in foreign services, is sponsoring the bill and has been meeting with other MPs in an effort to shore up support.

But she’s been hearing some things that concern her, she said Tuesday.

“Over the last few weeks, I’ve heard so much misinformation about this bill, and I fear it’s coming from up above in the government,” Laverdiere said, suggesting the prime minister’s office and cabinet are holding the reins on the vote, urging Conservative MPs to oppose Bill C-398.

“What I fear, and I do hope so much I’m mistaken, is that politics is playing more of a role this time.”

Her bill aims to overhaul Canada’s Access to Medicines Regime – a law passed in 2004 that was supposed to help get Canadian generic medicines to developing countries, but turned out to be a dismal failure.

Since Parliament unanimously passed that law eight years ago, only one company has taken advantage of it, sending one shipment of one HIV/AIDS treatment to one country. But after wading through mountains of red tape to get that one batch overseas, the company that made the shipment said it would not try again until the regime was reformed.

So Laverdiere made her plea, calling on Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Industry Minister Christian Paradis and International Cooperation Minister Julian Fantino to support the legislation – or at least “allow their MPs to vote their conscience.”

Earlier in the day, Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq got a tour of an HIV/AIDS research lab at the Ottawa General Hospital, where she announced funding for new research.

Asked whether the Conservatives would support the bill, Aglukkaq said they “will look at it,” and declined comment on what concerns she might have about the proposed legislation.

“There’s a process in place that we’ll go through in the House, and we’ll leave it to that,” she said.

Aglukkaq wasn’t among the two dozen Conservative MPs who supported the NDP the last time it tried to pass similar legislation.

Neither was Paradis. And he won’t be supporting it this time, either.

“This bill doesn’t accomplish what it claims to,” he said Tuesday afternoon, before highlighting actions the government has taken to help get HIV/AIDS treatments to countries in need. “We are all for the virtue, but this bill is not the good vehicle to get there … So we have to oppose it, but this doesn’t mean that we are against providing medicines.”

As it stands, the law requires generic drug producers to have in hand a request from a country for a specific drug before it can begin negotiations for a licence with the patent-holder.

What Bill C-398 proposes is creating a single-licence scheme, allowing generic drug companies to apply once for permission to produce any quantity of a patented medicine that it can then send to any eligible country, as laid out by the World Trade Organization, without ever having to re-apply.

The proposed legislation builds on an NDP bill from the last Parliament. After MPs implemented several amendments, that bill passed the House of Commons in March 2011. It died in the Senate, however, when the government was defeated shortly after.

Even though a majority of MPs supported the bill, it proved divisive.

Of those who didn’t support the bill, some were concerned the bill would diminish motivation among Canada’s pharmaceutical companies to research and develop new medicines, or that the less expensive drugs would find their way onto the black market. Others wondered whether there was even an appetite for Canada’s generic medicines, which can cost more than those produced in other countries.

Laverdiere has recently been hearing those same concerns in the halls of Parliament – concerns she says aren’t defensible.

“I don’t think the opposition is based on the merits of the bill,” she told reporters Tuesday afternoon. “This vote should not be dictated by the prime minister’s office … This bill will save lives.”

The most recent data indicates eight million people in low- and middle-income countries worldwide are receiving the antiretroviral medications needed to treat HIV/AIDS – up from just a few hundred thousand about 10 years ago. But that only represents about half of the estimated 15 million people in those communities who need them – and less than one-quarter of the children in need.

If the bill passes tomorrow’s vote, it will be passed on to a Commons committee for further study.

Chief Government Whip Gordon O’Connor’s office did not respond to an email asking whether the vote would be free or whipped.

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