The fifth of a series prepared by the International Institute for Sustainable Development and the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development. In what many described as an ‘historic' development, the TRIPs Council — at the request of the African Group and supported by many developing countries — took up the issue of intellectual property rights and access to medicines in June 2001 at a time when the WTO was coming under increasing criticism for allegedly impeding developing countries' access to medicines. The subsequent long and difficult discussions culminated in the adoption of the Doha Declaration on the TRIPs Agreement and Public Health in November 2001 in which countries stressed that the TRIPs Agreement did not and should not prevent Members from taking measures to protect public health.
