Industry committee  We wouldn't know the answer to that either.

Industry committee  I think the duration of a licence is reasonably generous. It's two years with a two-year renewal, so it's actually a four-year licence. I think part of the rationale behind that is this. If prices drop, if new technology comes on that's a little better, do you really want to tie governments into unending contracts without a way out?

Industry committee  Forecasting is a challenge because they don't know how many people they're going to treat in some of those countries. It's all dependent on the number of health care centres and nurses, on being able to get into rural communities, the infrastructure, transportation, and things like that.

Industry committee  I think it's pretty minimal notification, to be honest with you.

Industry committee  Yes, and I've stated before that I think the notification requirement is very important. I don't think it imposes an undue burden.

Industry committee  If you're not a member of the WTO.

Industry committee  To clarify one of Mr. McTeague's points. If you're a least-developed country that's not a member of the WTO, you can come directly to Canada, you don't have to post at the WTO. It's only for WTO members, and that's consistent with every country that's introduced this legislation.

Industry committee  In our opening comments we addressed that a little bit. The value in schedule 1 is that it addresses the intent of the legislation and the intent of the WTO decision, which was to address the very serious diseases, such as HIV/AIDS and malaria and tuberculosis. Having no list would mean that there's a potential for those diseases to be ignored while you try to copy drugs in other categories where they could be either more profitable or more broadly used.

Industry committee  It's in the legislation and it's also in the agreement of the WTO. It's not blocked by us at all.

Industry committee  A country just has to declare that they have no ability to manufacture the drug, that's all. They just have to send a letter to the WHO and post it. That's all they have to do.

Industry committee  I think in the majority of cases, because of preferential pricing, there exist either at cost or below cost in the least developed countries. They're usually either at cost or have a very small markup in the developing or more developed countries, with the anticipation that in the developed world they're going to pay the full price.

Industry committee  There are a couple of points. In the spirit of transparency, companies should be notified if you're going to go to that extraordinary step of overriding patents to create compulsory licence. I think out of due process you have a right to know. I don't see any reason why, if the generic has a country identified through the WTO, that a voluntary licence from our industry would not be issued.

Industry committee  That's a WTO requirement that 146 countries signed on to, that they needed to notify the WTO that they had insufficient manufacturing to produce these kinds of drugs. The suggestion was made that Canada should go to the WTO and change this agreement of 146 countries. Those negotiations are tough enough to do in the first place.

Industry committee  We are working with all of the major funding bodies that are involved with the procurement of drugs. Some of that work on our side, as I mentioned earlier, is through technology transfer. There are a number of AIDS companies that have transferred technology to generic drugs in both India and in Africa.

Industry committee  There are no patents on those drugs. We don't have to go through the Canadian legislation.