Lu Yong: Chinese Buyers Club

China is prosecuting Lu Yong for importing illegals drugs. But the person was doing to keep his right to live. A leukemia patient was caught for smuggling life-saving drugs illegally into China to keep himself and others alive. A drug when would cost 1000 yuan would cost 100 when bought from India pharma companies. The strict patent regime made the life difficult when it comes to life saving drugs. The medicines are out of reach for majority of the population. The story doesn't ends in China but the ordeal continue in Thailand, Brazil, African countries.

For multinational pharma companies, life saving medicine is just a business but for third world its a matter of life and death. In most cases, the customs department release the seized goods on humanity grounds. But still the strict patent regime continue the ordeal of patients who needed the life saving drugs. While developing countries mulls amending patents law, the MNC pharma companies lobby against the move. For them, Indian pharma companies are high value target to be taken out from the market to get upper hand. Since most buyers club depend on India for generic version of life saving drugs, MNCs started pestering Indian pharma industries with unwanted litigation.

It is good to amend patent law favoring the production of generic medicine. If not then one day medicine would turn to be high cost luxury product. Creating a cure for new disease is commendable and the researchers who spent whole life for the such innovation must be rewarded but with any other lives. The very purpose of invention get a wrong notion when it fails to benefit majority of the human population..

For multi national companies, the drug they produce must fetch profit along with cost incurred in such researches. But such approach when it comes to life saving drugs defeat the very purpose of citizen welfare. We are not still stuck at the old notion of warring state. The Concept is Gross National Happiness is taking precedence over the old Gross Development product. Such notion gains success when citizens are provided with adequate welfare schemes.

The law might stamp him as wrongdoer but the equity discharge him. Lu Yong, not only saved his life, tried to save many others. The charges were that he was trying to smuggle goods illegally. Had he done it for profit the state action is justifiable. When a law which does injustice then such law shall be considered as no law. Hope the the cause of Yu Long might turn the tide in the developing world.