Go Brazil!

Reuters reports from Rio de Janeiro that Brazil has taken the first step toward breaking an AIDS drug patent when the Health Ministry decreed the drug was in the "public interest" and too expensive to buy.

The drug, Efavirenz, is patented by Merck & Co., which refused Brazil's request for a sharp price reduction so that the government could afford to supply the drug to an estimated 75,000 people who need it. Brazil's lauded AIDS treatment program guarantees free drug cocktails to Brazilians with AIDS, according to Reuters. (Are you listening, George W. Bush?)

The report also said that Brazil wanted Merck to cut the price of Efavirenz to $0.65 per pill--the same price paid by Thailand--from the $1.59 per pill paid by Brazil.

OK, so it's not a cancer drug, but it's a great precedent, as far as I'm concerned.

Next up, Herceptin?

This breast-cancer drug costs $2,000 a dose in the UK and anywhere from $4600 to $9,600 a dose in the United States. Read more on Herceptin: The True Cost of Herceptin

Read: Brazil closer to breaking Merck AIDS drug patent

@ Jeanne Sather 2007.