Category Access to Medicine

Vaccine nationalism and crisis profiteering: Unions take action

[Education International] Just 10 countries, some of the richest in the world, have administered 75% of vaccinations. Meanwhile, around 130 countries that account for 2.5 billion people have not administered a single dose. This is not an issue on which we can afford to be passive. The only solution to a global pandemic is global solidarity,” stated David Edwards, Education International General Secretary, opening EI’s webinar on vaccine equity...Education International and its member organisations fully support the TRIPS waiver proposal and will continue to push, at both national and international levels, for equitable access to lifesaving vaccines and medical products. Click here for more information on the TRIPS waiver proposal. Click here for more.

Competition Regulation in Healthcare in South Africa

[Hardin Ratshisusu] South Africa’s nascent competition regulatory regime is coming of age and has potential to address historical market concentration challenges previously enabled by the apartheid regime, prior to its dismantling in the 1990s. Many sectors of the economy are highly concentrated, including the private healthcare sector, with market outcomes that breed market failures, lack of competitiveness and high cost of care. Looking through competition in the healthcare sector it becomes evident that the market structure challenges do not only require domestic interventions, but also a global response to address some policy and regulatory gaps.

Sign-On STATEMENT TO WTO In Support of TRIPS WAIVER: Copyright Barriers Prevent an Equitable Response to COVID-19

A group of 27 civil society organizations has drafted a statement to the World Trade Organization (WTO) highlighting the need to overcome copyright barriers to ensure an equitable response to COVID-19. The statement is open for endorsements from both organizations and from individuals until March 18. It will be formally submitted to the WTO on March 22.

The TRIPS Waiver Proposal: An Urgent Measure to Expand Access to the COVID-19 Vaccines

[Henrique Zeferino de Menezes] Despite multilateral commitments and political statements of solidarity and cooperation to guarantee the availability and access to COVID-19 vaccines (and other relevant technologies for control and treatment), the scenario after the beginning of vaccination is marked by the deepening of vaccine nationalism, the concentration of inputs and vaccines production, and the uneven distribution of options of vaccine doses already approved for use. This pattern of production restrictions and unequal access will lead to an increase in international inequalities, leaving a large part of the world to have access to vaccines not until 2024.

Hundreds of Prominent US Civil Society Organizations Call on Pres. Biden to Stop Blocking COVID-19 WTO Waiver to Boost Vaccines, Treatments Worldwide

[Public Citizen] Today, U.S. consumer, faith, health, labor, human rights, development and other civil society groups urged the White House to support an emergency COVID-19 waiver of World Trade Organization (WTO) intellectual property rules, so that greater supplies of vaccines, treatments, and diagnostic tests can be produced in as many places as possible as quickly as possible. The pandemic cannot be stopped anywhere unless vaccines, tests, and treatments are available everywhere, so variants that evade current vaccines do not develop. At a press conference joined by Reps. Rosa DeLauro, (D-Conn.), Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) and Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), U.S. civil society leaders released a letter signed by hundreds of prominent U.S. organizations calling on the Biden administration to join more than 100 nations in support of the waiver. The Trump administration led a handful of countries opposed to the waiver at the WTO. At two recent WTO committee meetings, the new administration has not reversed the Trump era obstruction of the waiver.

Scope of Compulsory License and Government Use of Patented Medicines in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic

[HIPB, South Centre] To meet public health needs, such as in the current COVID-19 emergency, governments can use compulsory licenses and government use as a tool for procurement and import of patented medicines. These mechanisms are provided for in most laws worldwide. The WTO TRIPS Agreement, as reaffirmed by the Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health, recognises the right of WTO members to grant compulsory licenses and their freedom to determine the grounds upon which such licenses may be granted.

Reconsiderations on global and local manufacturing of medical products after COVID-19

[Germán Velásquez] The unprecedented global health crisis caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic since the first quarter of 2020 has reopened the now-urgent discussion about the role of local pharmaceutical production in addressing the health needs in developing countries. The COVID-19 crisis has highlighted the interdependencies in the global production of pharmaceuticals—no country is self-sufficient. Many industrialized countries are making the decision to repatriate or initiate the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and medicines.

Licensing Life-Saving Drugs for Developing Countries: Evidence from the Medicines Patent Pool

[Alberto Galasso, Mark Schankerman] Abstract: We study the effects of a patent pool on the licensing and adoption of life-saving drugs in low- and middle-income countries. Using data on licensing and sales for HIV, hepatitis C and tuberculosis drugs, we show that there is an immediate and large increase in licensing by generic firms when a patent is included in the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP). This finding is robust to identification strategies to deal with endogeneity of MPP patents and countries. The impact of the MPP is especially large for small, non-Sub-Saharan countries. The impact on actual entry and sales, however, is much smaller than on licensing, which is due to geographic bundling of licenses by the MPP. More broadly, the paper highlights the potential of pools in promoting technology diffusion of biomedical innovation. Click here for more.

Intellectual Property Pools and Aggregation

Abstract: This chapter in the forthcoming case book "Intellectual Property Licensing and Transactions: Theory and Practice" covers IP pooling, with an emphasis on patents. It begins with a discussion of the theoretical benefit of pooling, including efficiency gains and the avoidance of blocking positions, thickets and anti-commons. It then addresses antitrust analysis of pooling transactions from Standard Oil (Indiana) v. United States (U.S. 1931) through the 2017 DOJ-FTC Antitrust Guidelines. The chapter then turns to pools created to facilitate standard-setting, including the MPEG-2 and 3GPP Pools, and discusses the concept of complementarity and essentiality of pooled assets. It concludes with brief discussions of Princo v. ITC (Fed. Cir. 2010) and the rise of patent aggregators such as RPX Corp.

Revisiting the Question of Extending the Limits of Protection of Pharmaceutical Patents and Data Outside the EU – The Need to Rebalance

[Daniel Opoku Acquah] The European Union (EU) has instituted internal and external measures aimed at protecting and enforcing intellectual property rights. In the area of pharmaceutical patents, the Union has also sought to protect its industries through patent term extension and data exclusivity. Recent EU free trade agreements (FTAs) with developing countries contain chapters on intellectual property that extend patent terms and data exclusivity for pharmaceutical products. Such acts further prolong the lifespan of protection given to existing products and limit generic market entry.

One product, many patents: Imperfect intellectual property rights in the pharmaceutical industry

[Charu N. Gupta] Abstract: Economists’ standard notion of intellectual property rights considers a single patent per product, with a clearly defined scope, certain enforcement, and a fixed term of monopoly protection. Yet common across industries are “imperfect” intellectual property rights: More than one patent may cover a single product, with the scope and enforcement of each uncertain, contributing to an indeterminate period of monopoly protection. Using data on the pharmaceutical industry, I systematically document the presence of imperfect intellectual property rights and provide the first evidence on the extent to which they impact competition.

Urgently waive intellectual property rules for vaccine

[Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch] Governments should stop blocking a temporary waiver of some global intellectual property rules that will help boost global access to COVID-19 vaccines, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today ahead of a key World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Geneva on December 10, 2020. If adopted, the waiver proposal would enable more governments to fulfil their obligations to respect the rights to life and health. The warning comes as vaccinations for COVID-19 begin in the United Kingdom, and are likely to begin in other countries in the near future.