Brussels, 27/06/2011 (Agence Europe) - India confirmed last week at the UN summit on AIDS that the bilateral free-trade agreement it is negotiating with the EU will not include a data exclusivity clause. Since negotiations opened in 2007, India has refused to go beyond its WTO commitments in that part of the agreement which relates to trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPS). India, backed by the NGO Médecins sans frontiers (MSF), fears that exclusivity might block the access of other developing countries to its generic medicines. Thanks to its progressive legislation, India has become a powerful producer of generic medicines, medicines which are vital to millions of patients in developing countries. MSF uses, for example, Indian anti-retrovirals to treat tens of thousands of Africans carrying the HIV/Aids virus. Data exclusivity would delay registration of generics by 10 years, even for medicines which do not need patent protection under Indian law, MSF said in a press release. While welcoming that there will be no data exclusivity clause in the EU-India agreement, MSF calls on the EU and India to abandon the other provisions which constitute a threat to public health in developing countries, drawing attention in particular to the extreme intellectual property measures and the special protection for the trade interests of foreign investors in India. These are clauses which, MSF says, will make the generic medicines so needed in the treatment of Aids much more expensive. (E.H./transl.rt)