India to move WTO on Dutch drug seizure

NEW DELHI: India and Brazil have decided to mount a joint offensive at the World Trade Organisation against the Netherlands for seizing a consignment in transit, which was on its way from India to Brazil.

The cargo, containing a generic drug for high blood pressure, was impounded by Dutch officials on a complaint by a local firm that had claimed it had the patent for high blood pressure drugs in the Netherlands.

Commerce minister Kamal Nath and his Brazilian counterpart Celso Amorim met on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum at Davos, and decided to take up the matter with the WTO at its general council meeting next week.

According to a joint press release, such measures have a highly negative systemic impact on legitimate trade of generic medicines, South-South commerce, and national public health policies.

Losartan, the generic drug for treating high blood pressure, manufactured by Dr Reddy’s Laboratory, was seized in Rotterdam and was sent back to India.

The Dutch company that claimed it had patent for a similar drug in The Netherlands does not have patent protection in India or Brazil.

The Indo-Brazil joint statement emphasised that the move was a setback for the internationally guaranteed principle of universal access to medicine, running against the spirit of resolution 2002/31 of the Commission on Human Rights on the right to enjoy the highest standards of physical and mental health.