The rollcall for the biosimilars vote in on the Internet here. Based upon the count released by the committee, voting for the Eshoo Amendment were 26 Democrats and 21 Republicans. Voting against were 1 republican (Deal) and 10 Democrats. One Republican did not vote. I have bolded the Nay votes.
By James Love, on July 31st, 2009
On Thursday, July 30, 2009, the White House office of the United States Trade Representative denied release of 4 new proposals for text that were circulated in July to “all countries” in the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) negotiations. The request was limited to documents that were prepared in the past 90 days for purpose of discussion at the July 2009 ACTA negotiating meeting held in Morocco.
USTR located 4 such documents, but denied the FOIA request under 5 USC 552(b)(1). The specific exception cited reads as follows:
The Obama Administration, with the support of a Democrat-controlled U.S. Congress, is insisting the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) negotiations be conducted in secret. We know, from documents obtained in Europe and the summaries released in April 2009, that the draft ACTA has sections that deal with both injunctions and damages. We don’t have the current text. Continue Reading
As candidates, almost all democrats have promised voters, in several elections, they will support parallel trade in pharmaceuticals from Canada and other high income countries. As elected officials, nothing happens. President Obama already has authority to permit imports of medicines, if he wanted to exercise it. But not only is the White House not fullfillinbg the promise to allow imports, it has promised the CEO of PhRMA and several big companies that they won’t allow parallel trade in the health reform bill.
The July 20, 2009 issue of BioCentury has an extensive report on the “Biosimilar fire Drill.” It discusses in detail the lobbying by the Biotechnology Industry Association (BIO, bio.org) to defeat efforts by President Obama, OMB, the FTC, Representative Waxman, Senator Brown, AARP, Public Citizen, PIRG, Consumers Union, KEI, Essential Action, and others, to reform the regulation to biologic medicines, so there is more generic competition. Continue Reading
*The author thanks Professor Marc Perlman (Brown University) for his comprehensive notes on the IGC deliberations.
TACD has issued a resolution on copyright terms, and measures to mitigate the harm from excessive terms. The TACD Press release follows: