Not in the interest of Europe's pharmaceutical industry

The blogster has pretty much stayed out of the fray about the various "free trade" agreements currently in different stages of deliberation.

The reason is simple: not enough information.

The exceptions so far were one post about the protection or loss thereof of German regional sausage names as well as the recent post on the non-recognition of human learning.

Regional agricultural produce was one of the few areas that prompted some actual news coverage on TTIP and gave the blogster the long awaited opportunity to use the term "sausage fest".

Another area of TTIP as well as the EU-Canadian equivalent CETA that did make it into wider news in Europe was the issue of Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS). Had it not been for European companies dragging some EU jurisdictions before such "arbitration", the whole system might have stayed under the radar of the public.

With the Pacific rim TTP finalized, TTIP/CETA are getting some attention again, and what little - mostly leaked - information the public as well as the national lawmakers have, really leaves only one conclusion.

TTIP/CETA/TISA have either no or next to no benefits for the vast majority of the citizens in the countries affected by the agreements.

Almost no more tariffs was one of the first alleged benefits - until someone pointed out that tariffs are already miniscule in most areas.

Claims of more jobs were a big argument by proponents for a while but fizzled.

The next big pro argument was that the same standards of protection will be ensured. And so the negotiators dutifully set about to protect Jambon de Bayonne, Beaufort, and Nürnberger Rostbratwürste, with a combined sales volume of a few million Euros in a market of 1 billion consumers.
But nobody has as yet explained what exactly "grandfathering and phasing out" means for these three insignificant products.

While it is really easy to blame the negotiators for everything, this leaked document has a few nuggets:
1) Criticism of the original ISDS mechanism did lead to some changes!
2) The Canadians wanted to leave the hot issue of "Intellectual Property" outside of the ISDS coverage.
Which sounds like a dream of CETA critics come true, doesn't it?
3) The EU rejected the proposal because "it is not in the interest of Europe's pharmaceutical industry".

As this fairly recent German non-profit news organization reports, "harmonization" of standards is indeed a top priority in the negotiations, though not quite as simple as consumers might think. The Trans-Atlantic Business Council and industry want IP/patent rules harmonized to the more protective (i.e. longer) periods that exist for some products.

So, just by extending protection periods in the IP field, whatever other benefits might exist for consumers will vanish into thin air.

No amount of sausage and cheese will make up for the billions lost by pushing out the introduction of "generic" medications by just a couple of years.

Since neither the public nor lawmakers are getting all the information they need, the blogster reminds everybody of the earlier "I don't know" post.

[Update 10/11] Spelling