Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-01-30-Speech-4-042"
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"en.20030130.2.4-042"2
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".
Mr President, the action programme to counter poverty diseases which the European Union is setting up is vital, but it must be complete. The people in the South are still dying of HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, but our words speak louder than our actions. These people also suffer from dengue, trypanosomoses and other filariases, but I am sad to say that nothing is being done to combat these diseases.
Above all I deplore the informal procedure which has prevailed until today’s debate. Having been subjected to strong pressure from the Commission and the Council to adopt this regulation at first reading, so as to allow the programme to come into force quickly, we have actually suffered real blackmail at the hands of these institutions, which are determined to weaken this report and to undermine our powers of codecision. We were surprised at their reluctance to accept a precise reference to the declaration on public health and intellectual property adopted at Doha, and the rights that it gives developing countries with regard to access to medicines. What happened to those European declarations emphasising health before profits?
On many occasions, the European Parliament has reaffirmed that access to treatments at cost price is inseparable from prevention, from the strengthening of health systems and structures, particularly the public services, and from research and development. The Commission had seemed to be receptive to Parliament’s arguments as long as they were not binding. Faced with this legislative regulation, however, its attitude changed. Thus in Geneva last December, in the context of the negotiations at the TRIPS Council, the Member States and the Commission could hardly be said to have been inspired by the European Parliament’s resolutions on access to medicines. The European Union’s preferred solution for countries which, not having any production capacity of their own, have to import medicines under compulsory licence from other countries was totally unworkable for developing countries. By an ironic twist of fate, this bad agreement was rejected by the United States, which wanted to reduce its scope even further. The general budget for the programme has also been revised downwards: EUR 350 million for a five-year programme is very little when we consider what is at stake, and it is much less than the EUR 500 million originally requested.
In conclusion, I would say that we should adopt this regulation as a matter of urgency, but not at the price of democracy. We Members of the European Parliament are here not to promote our own selfish interests, but to promote the interests of the citizens of the world."@en1
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