I've been reading the 4th edition of Philip W. Grubb's Patents for Chemicals, Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology, and so far, it's an excellent textbook. I would highly recommend it for those interested in the historical and philosophical developments of intellectual property rights in the biosciences.
This section on patents in developing countries caught my attention; I thought I would share an excerpt:
The entry into force of the
TRIPs agreement in 1995 came at a time when the extent of the AIDS epidemic in Africa was becoming clear. Patented anti-retroviral drugs were being used in the USA and Europe to control the progression of the disease, but these drugs were very expensive and unaffordable for the vast majority of patients in developing countries. The perception arose, fostered by NGOs such as Médicins sans Frontières (MSF) and Oxfam, that patents were the reason why these drugs were not being made available to AIDS sufferers at an affordable price.
In fact, patents are not the problem. Not only are there no patents for most of these AIDS drugs in most African countries, there are also no patents in any countries for most of the drugs on the WHO Essential Drugs list—so why then are these essential drugs not readily available to patients in poor countries? The answer is simply lack of money to buy even cheap medicines, and lack of social and medical infrastructure to deliver them. The terrible truth is that if AIDS could be cured by a glass of clean water, there would still be millions who would have no access to the cure. Unfortunately, patents and the 'greedy' pharmaceutical companies make a much easier target than the miserly rich country governments and the corrupt poor country governments who together make up the real problem.
Despite the lecturing tone, Grubb succeeds in highlighting the asymmetric flow of criticism with regards to problems of the Third World. While it's common to hear that these problems stem from the actions of Wealthy Americans and Their Tool the WTO, we hear relatively little about the role of bad governance. Poor governance and lack of independent press consistently give rise to famine and abysmal social conditions (see: Zimbabwe), but few seem willing to confront this problem head-on. This brings to mind what I previously wrote regarding the whole Mohammed cartoon fiasco.
Grubb continues:
However, the pharmaceutical industry also did a lot of damage to its own image, notably by its legal action in the South African courts against the South African government over a proposed law for
compulsory licensing of some pharmaceuticals. The proposed law was contrary to
TRIPs and arguably unconstitutional, but the spectacle of the pharmaceutical industry suing Nelson Mandela (who was then still President, and was the first name on the list of defendants) in order to maintain control of drug supplies was a public relations disaster of the first magnitude.
Apparently, this debacle influenced the 2001 WTO meeting in Doha, as well as 2003 meeting in Cancun. This is quite an important story, because its outcome will affect how poor countries obtain access to pharmaceuticals. In particular, the result will decide whether poor countries obtain their drugs through legitimate or through illegal means.
One point of note is that if property rights for medicines were universally enforced, drug prices wouldn't be so high here in the U.S.A. Overseas manufacturers of cheap generics that infringe upon patents of pharma innovators are pirating intellectual property. Pharma piracy causes real damage to the actual innovators, because they lose out on income that would help recoup the cost of development; the result is higher drug prices for all and reduced investment in R&D.
In a global world, we are increasingly influenced by bad governance overseas. First World countries should be insisting on good government in the Third World. Unfortunately, the continuing legacy of colonialism makes things extraordinarily difficult.
