2011/20 | LEM Working Paper Series | |
Issues in the Post-2005 TRIPS agenda |
||
Benjamin Coriat, Luigi Orsenigo |
||
Keywords | ||
Pharmaceuticals, IPR, right to health care, Pandemics and TRIPS
|
||
JEL Classifications | ||
|
||
Abstract | ||
Pharmaceuticals is one of the few industries in which patents are
recognized as being key instruments for privately appropriating the
economic benefits of innovation. Competition is largely based on
innovation, and basic science is becoming increasingly crucial for the
discovery and development of new products. Pharmaceuticals also
occupy an extremely socially sensitive sector: large parts of the
population increasingly perceive health care as a fundamental human
right. For developing countries in particular, health has become a
major issue, magnified by the tragedies of pandemics like HIV/AIDS.
Controversies about the welfare implications of patents have
characterized this industry ever since its inception. But in the last
thirty years or so, the establishment of a strong tendency towards an
extremely tight IP at the global level regime has made this debate
even more heated. In this work, we begin by succinctly reviewing the
main problems and the available evidence concerning the relationships
between IPRs, innovation and welfare in pharmaceuticals. Next, we
summarize the main theoretical arguments in favour and against
(strong) IPRs in pharmaceuticals and present the little direct
available empirical evidence, concerning respectively innovation and
drug prices. Fianlly, we focus on TRIPS and Access to Care in
developing countries, with particular reference to the case of HIV
(the most emblematic example of the problems generated by enforcement
of the TRIPS agreement).
|
||
Downloads | ||
|
||
Back |