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Senator Mar Roxas lauded Thursday Speaker Prospero Nograles and the
House for resolving the remaining kink in the Quality Affordable
Medicines Act, thus assuring its passage before Labor Day and
enabling thousands of poor patients to get quality medicine at
affordable prices.
At Malacañang, Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye
said the US lobby against the measure must be junked on legal
grounds.
“I thank Speaker Prospero Nograles and the
House panel headed by Palawan Rep. Tony Alvarez for agreeing to deal
with the issue of ‘generics only’ prescriptions in a separate
bill. The Quality Affordable Medicines bill can now become a law
with no hurdles left to its passage,” Roxas said in a press
statement.
The House agreed with the Senate position to
delete the provision limiting doctors’ prescriptions to generics
drugs after President Gloria Arroyo and Health Secretary Francisco
Duque 3rd said this could be the subject of a separate measure.
Roxas, principal author of the Senate bill and
chairman of the Senate panel to the bicameral conference committee,
proposed to jumpstart the implementation of the measure with a
P1-billion special fund to purchase quality drugs from India.
Parallel importation amends the Intellectual
Property Code to enable the importation of patented drugs and allow
generic manufacturers to test, register and produce drugs prior to
the expiration of a patent, which is normally 20 years. All
importations must be approved by the Bureau of Food and Drugs.
At the Palace, Bunye said the US lobby against
the cheaper medicines measure should be junked.
“What I’m saying is that we have legal
experts among our congressmen and senators and they have studied the
legal aspect of the law. They have studied this sufficiently and I
think they have covered all aspects of the law,” Bunye said.
He added that drugs to be covered by the law are
off patent. And like other countries, the Philippines could also
mass produce or import those products.
-- Efren L. Danao with Angelo S. Samonte
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