Background: The lower sales price of generic lamivudine has caused healthcare administrators to consider abolishing fixed-dose antiretroviral combinations (FDCs) that contain lamivudine and emtricitabine. The alternative is to administer the individual components of the FDCs separately, thus...

This paper examines the role of policy entrepreneurs and global activists in shaping the international market for antiretroviral drugs to combat HIV/AIDS. When ARVs first came on the market in the 1990s they were exceedingly expensive; the cost of treatment was upwards of $10,000 per year. These...

According to Attaran and Gillespie-White (2001), there is no link between patents and poor access to HIV/AIDS treatments in Africa since multinationals patent a few. Questioning what the authors call the rule and the exceptions, this paper shows that multinationals use patents as entry barriers...