Essay on Interest in Humana Rights, Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines Written by Richard KAYIBANDA

This piece of work is essentially intended to answer the question of why I am interests in Human Rights, Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines. First and foremost, I am a lawyer by training and currently working partially in academic area as a Tutorial Assistant in the Faculty of Law of the National University of Rwanda and partially as the Legal Assistant of the Legal Aid Clinic of the same Faculty. Te objective of this Clinic is a twofold one. Firstly, it helps students to confront real legal problem; thus marrying theories acquired in class with the legal reality on the ground. Secondly, it serves as a service to the community in the sense that it offers free legal advice to vulnerable groups of people (ranging from indigent people, people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS in so far as their legal problems are concerned, orphans, etc.). In as much as I am concerned, I coach students in finding adequate solutions to the legal problems from clients of the Clinic and as a Legal Assistant I participate in programmes (activities ) of advocacy for legal reforms where necessary and sensitization. In fact, the wide range of legal cases we receive make us aware of legal lacunae and inconsistency in different legal provisions. And in this situation, we advocate for new legislation to fill the loopholes and amendment in case of inconsistencies. To do such kind of advocacy one must be well equipped with legal knowledge of available legal solutions.

To go further, it is with my encounter with people living with HIV/AIDS in the Unit of the Legal Aid Clinic that I realized the issue of access to medicines was so crucial. When I began to be more aware of this issue and began to do preliminary researches in order to know where to press for reform I realized that the big problem was the expensiveness of medicines. Things got more complicated when I realized, thanks to the course of Intellectual Property Law I did early 2011 as a Masters student in Business Law, that this expensiveness is mainly due to rights of inventors of those new medicines which are protected by Intellectual Property Law. At this stage I was in dilemma since it is the obligation of the States not only to ensure realization of the right to health whose components include access to medicine1; but also to protect intellectual property rights. In the last endeavor, States and Regional organizations2 are enacting or amending intellectual property laws; but one can rightly wonder how human rights aspects are being taken into account in those endeavors. What is surprising, however, is that in all those efforts flexibilities offered by Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement are being ignored3 despite the extreme need of EAC member countries populations of access to essential medicines. In brief, having realized this crucial problem of accessed to medicines not only in Rwanda; but also in East African Community region and the current trend of enacting and amending laws related to intellectual property which do not take into account human rights aspects involved and

See Article 12 of International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and Dr. S. MARKS and F. X. BAGNOUD, OHCHR Expert Consultation on Access to Medicines (HRC Resolution 12/24) of 11 October 2010. 2 East African Community has developed a policy and a bill in this regards and its (or some) members countries are doing the same (see Regional Network for Equity in Health in East and Southern Africa, Center For Health, Human Rights and Development and TARSC, Anti-counterfeiting laws and access to medicines in East and Southern Africa:Policy brief number 22 available at <http://www.cehurd.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Policy-Brief-onAnti-Counterfeiting-Laws-in-ESA-Countries.pdf>, accessed on 1st August 2011.) 3 Ibidem

given my daily activities of doing advocacy among policy makers and lawmakers I am truly convinced that a forum to discuss with fellows from EAC would be given a red carpet welcome. I hope and believe that this school on Human Rights, Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines would be a good and without equivalent opportunity for this. I am truly convinced that at its end I will be able to convincingly carry out advocacy, which falls within my attributions as a legal assistant in the Clinic I work for, near the relevant Government/State institutions concerned with the issues of access to medicine, human rights and intellectual property. In fact, I was, in one way or the other, trained in Human Rights and Intellectual Property Rights separately; but the nexus between the two and access to medicines was not covered. Thus, this opportunity would indeed enrich my package necessary for any advocacy (which is part of my duties as a legal assistant to the Legal Clinic) for ensuring access to medicine as a component of the right to health.