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Fair Trade Archive: GTW E-Newsletters, Action Alerts, and Updates

Public Health and Safety

Given the potentially serious and far-reaching consequences of agreements such as the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) and the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), it is absolutely imperative that Congress and Senate reject current Fast Track proposals and instead develop clear, enforceable limits for our negotiators to ensure that new trade rules do not undermine the public regulation and provision of health care and other services.

FTAA and GATS could have far-reaching effects on the ability of national, state and local governments, to:

• protect the public's access to essential health care and social services, including life-saving AIDS medications and the health care safety net
• enact regulations that could challenge foreign investors, such as rules on non-profit conversions and certificate of need laws
• advance universal health care over privatized corporate care
• assure the rights of foreign and U.S. health care workers
• base procurement decisions on a corporation's compliance with human and labor rights, and with public health and environmental safeguards.

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