To better understand the benefits of the Gilead/MPP licenses, I have made some calculations of the persons living with HIV that are covered in the geographic areas of the various Gilead/MPP licenses.

•    TDF/FTC territories
•    COBI territories
•    EVG-Quad territories

Using 2009 UNIAIDS estimates for persons living with HIV, the table below reports the number of persons living with HIV in high income and middle and low income countries, and calculates the percent of persons living with HIV that are covered by the three sets of countries included in the Gilead/MPP licenses.

The EVG-Quad license, which is the most restrictive of the Gilead/MPP licenses in terms of geographic coverage, provides licensed coverage for 80 percent of all persons living with HIV, and 85 percent of persons with HIV living in middle and low income countries. The TDF/FTC license provides licensed coverage for 84 percent of all persons living with HIV, and 90 percent of persons living in middle and low income countries. All licenses provide 100 percent coverage for persons living in LDC countries.

The Gilead/MPP licenses do provide a large enough coverage area to ensure efficient generic competition. For those countries not included in the Gilead/MPP licensed coverage area, this is still a major benefit, because they can obtain production from Indian generic supplies by requesting a compulsory license for export under Article 92A of the India patent law or another section of the India patent law, so long as the sale of the product is legal in the importing countries, either because it has no patent in place, or it has issued a compulsory license to import.