World Consumer Rights Day 15th March 2007

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This approach fuels unethical drug promotion in several ways. The most common violations include:

	Promoting misleading or false claims about a drug.
	Deliberately suppressing risks and side effects of a drug.
	Providing financial incentives to doctors for prescribing a drug to consumers.
	Using disease awareness campaigns for drug promotion rather than health promotion.

These methods can ultimately lead to irrational drug use by consumers, with potentialy fatal health risks. Consumers International believes consumer health must come above corporate profit. That’s why we are calling for transparency in disease awareness funding, full disclosure of clinical trial data, and an end to
gifts for doctors.

About World Consumer Rights Day

World Consumer Rights Day is an annual occasion for celebration and solidarity within the international consumer movement. But more importantly it is a time for promoting the basic rights of all consumers, for demanding that those rights are respected and protected, and for protesting the market abuses and social injustices which undermine them.

World Consumer Rights Day has its origins in former US President John F. Kennedy's declaration of four basic consumer rights:

•	the right to safety	See Pictures of the event
•	the right to be informed
•	the right to choose
•	the right to be heard.

To these, the consumer movement through Consumers International has in recent years added four more rights:

•	the right to satisfaction of basic needs the right to redress
•	the right to education the right to a healthy environment.

Together these eight rights form the basis for ongoing work by Consumers International and consumer groups worldwide. The Guidelines embrace the principles of the eight consumer rights and provide a framework for strengthening national consumer protection polices.

With the UN's adoption of the Guidelines, consumer rights were finally elevated to a position of international recognition and legitimacy, acknowledged by developed and developing countries alike. Yet they can continue to be ignored or trivialised by governments, producers and powerful interests. World Consumer Right Day draws attention to such violations, and provides a platform for consumer groups to address them in the countries where they operate.

How is World Consumer Rights Day Observed?

World Consumer Rights Day depends on local initiatives, planned and carried out by consumer organisations on every continent. Initiatives can take the shape of special campaigns, press conferences, public exhibitions, workshops, street events or new publications, to name only a few possibilities.

In Trinidad, World Consumer Rights Day will be celebrated by the hosting of the 6th Annual Symposium, the theme being Globalisaation - The Challenge for Youth. It is a two-day symposium, which will be held at the Centre of Excellence, Macoya and is open to the public.

Pakistan is organizing a walk and seminar on 15 th of March 2007

Preparation is going on to celebrate World Consumer Rights Day worldwide. With an objectives to create awareness amongst the consumers about their rights and to educate them to avail these rights, Helpline Trust and Consumer Association of Pakistan is organizing a walk and seminar on 15 th of March 2007, in Karachi to celebrate this event.

To read more abour consumer rights, click here!

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