Brazil plays key role in improving access to medicines for all

The Role Brazil has played in changing global AIDS policy and promoting widespread access to AIDS treatment is explored in a new paper by academics from Scotland and the United States.

Brazil's large-scale, successful HIV/AIDS treatment program is considered a model for other developing countries aiming to improve access to AIDS treatment.

But far less is known about the country's important role in changing global norms related to international pharmaceutical policy, particularly international human rights, health and trade policies governing access to essential medicines.

Prompted by Brazil's interest in preserving its national AIDS treatment policies during World Trade Organisation (WTO) trade disputes with the US, these efforts to change global essential medicines norms have had important implications for other countries, particularly those aiming to increase the AIDS treatment they provide.

The paper, by Elize Massard da Fonseca of the University of Edinburgh and Brazil's Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, Amy Nunn of Brown University and Sofia Gruskin of the Harvard School of Public Health, was published online on 30 March in the journal Global Public Health.