Indonesia's ARV program attacked

Indonesia's government program to provide a triple-dose antiretroviral drug to HIV/AIDS patients has been criticized for violating patent holders to get a saving of "no more $140,000," according to an opinion piece in the Jakarta Post. The author blames antipatent propaganda for putting national pride and distrust of research-based pharmaceutical firms ahead of common sense.

The prevalence of HIV/AIDS in the South East Asian country has multiplied eightfold among drug users since 1998, according to the report's author, Joshua Livestro. There is a large gap between the estimated 170,000 HIV-positive population and the means to deliver ARVs, which currently only reach about 10,000 people. He notes that an attempt by the Indonesian government to increase distribution by abandoning negotiations with foreign drugmakers in preference for an anti-patent policy has failed.

In 2004, the government expropriated the intellectual property rights of foreign companies for lamivudine and nevirapine. As a result, the state-owned Kimia Farma has been allowed to produce a triple fixed-dose medication containing zidovudine, lamivudine and nevirapine.