Dilemma: Help the world by letting others do research and make generic drugs-or make money? That is the question for most pharmaceutical companies these days. And sadly, the answer is usually the latter. One of the biggest obstacles for many countries who cannot produce their own drugs is being able to get them from other countries. If a country cannot produce its own medicine, it must buy the medicine from other countries. However, this can be a very expensive option. For most Africans, buying a supply of medicine for HIV or AIDS is absolutely out of the question. Many of the problems stem from TRIPS, which is an international property rights agreement. This agreement is supposed to protect the patent rights of countries while still trying to protect against monopolies and abuses. However, this does not always happen. An example of this is Brazil. Brazil asked a pharmaceutical company, Abbott Laboratories, if it could make a generic form of an HIV drug to continue to cut the HIV epidemic. The company declined. Brazil then decided to use its right to allow a company inside the country to make a generic brand. Even though this was legal under the TRIPS document, the US threatened trade sanctions against Brazil and only removed them due to bad press. So I ask; which is more important-a healthier world or money?

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