The proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—a trade agreement between 12 Pacific Rim countries—jeopardizes the availability of generic medications for HIV and hepatitis C in developing countries, according to a new report by amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research.

Titled “Trans-Pacific Partnership: Curbing Access to Medicines Now and in the Future,” the report claims that the TPP expands intellectual property rights for pharmaceutical products in a way that far exceeds current standards set by the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.

Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam make up the 12 countries in the TPP. Together, they represent nearly 40 percent of the world’s GDP.

In a press release for the report, amfAR CEO Kevin Robert Frost says, “If the TPP moves forward, it will set a dangerous global precedent and put lifesaving drugs beyond the reach of millions of people with HIV/AIDS, cancer, tuberculosis and hepatitis C.”

To read a related POZ op-ed by Benjamin Gerritz of Cascade AIDS Project and the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign, click here.