China and India, in 2001 and 2005, respectively, amended their patent laws to comply with the World Trade Organization's Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement, which bans making generic copies of drugs still under patent protection. The move sparked concerns about the affordability of medicines in poor countries. But Bangladesh, categorized among the world's least developed countries (LDCs) according to the UN, hopes to fill the void—at least for the next five years.
Under the TRIPS agreement, LDCs can make generic versions of patented drugs until 2016. Bangladesh already has an estimated 350 drug companies, from small domestics to large multinationals, which produce 97% of its domestic demand for medicines. However, to make these medicines for domestic use and export, Bangladesh imports 80% of the active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), the chemicals responsible for a drug's action. “That is a weakness, as the imports do not make our pharma industry a fully integrated one,” Abdul Muktadir, secretary general of the Dhaka-based Bangladesh Association of Pharmaceutical Industries, told Nature Medicine.
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