The Economic Times

Brazil to buy AIDS drugs from India

7 May 2007

Brasilia, PTI: In order to provide AIDS drugs to maximum patients, the Brazil government has decided to purchase the cheaper drugs from an Indian lab.

The measure was adopted on Friday after long and unfruitful governmental negotiations with the US Merck Sharp and Dohme lab, producer of Efavirenz. The US lab sold Brazil that medicine valued at $1.50 and the country decided to purchase it from India, where a lab sells it for $0.44.

The decision was explained by Health Minister Jose Gomes Temporao, as part of a policy to provide the medicine to 75,000 AIDS patients in Brazil.

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