In his Oct. 12 op-ed “The United Nations Report on Access to Medicines is a Public Health Hazard,” John Graham took issue with UN recommendations, making what is essentially an argument for maintaining the status quo in our approach to bringing new drugs to market. Unfortunately, Mr. Graham misrepresents the current state of affairs and his argument shows disregard for the lives of people afflicted with illness in poor countries.
Completely absent from his point-of-view is the fact that under the status quo, people who have terrible diseases but live in wealthy countries have a private sector that is willing and able to do its best to come to the rescue for paying customers, whereas sick people in poor countries often do not.
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