This week in the Wall-Street Journal Dr. Els Torreele, director of the Access to Essential Medicines Initiative of the Open Society Foundation's Public Health Program based in New York, and Dr. Josh Bloom, director of chemical and pharmaceutical sciences at the American Council on Science and Health also based in New York, were asked an interesting question; should patents on pharmaceuticals be extended to encourage innovation?
They came down on opposite (but expected) sides of the issue. Bloom claimed that the economic securities provided by patent protections give Pharma companies the power and will to develop therapies and cures for the worst scourges known to man. Torreele, on the other hand, decried the exclusivity of broad patent extensions as the protection of a company’s market interests, which is independent of their ability to drive innovation.
Both made sound arguments, and in a utopian world, a sort of pragmatic compromise could be reached to maximize the positives and minimize the negatives for both ends. But like Madison, Jefferson, Hamilton, and the other classical thinkers, there is something genuinely novel about their staunch positioning’s; they thought it through and invite discourse.
As the Alliance’s President & CEO Dan Perry recently blogged in “The Battle Over Science in America - Where are you?” election time is upon us, and what better time to be engaged in discussions just like these. What is the role of FDA, NIH, and other government bodies in an increasingly modernizing society? How do you feel about Stem Cell Research, or end-of-life care? Do you believe better understanding the biological mechanisms behind the Aging Process are malleable (Spoiler Alert: We Do)? Or is the human body doomed to a long, difficult and costly bout with multiple costly-chronic diseases?
Let us, and others, know how you feel about these and other issues; or just think about these things once in a while. You’d be surprised how many issues you care about.
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Torreele, on the another labourer, decried the exclusivity of clear patent extensions as the infliction of a company's marketplace interests, which is individual of their knowledge to push creativity.
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I saw the article on the Wall Street. I am sure that it had many readers.
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Extending patents on pharmaceuticals will do nothing to increase medical innovation. As Einstein famously said, we can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.
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The pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies of the world rake in billions of dollars per year in revenues and proportionately large numbers in profits. A large part of that power to make great profits comes from investing in proprietary intellectual property, i.e., brand-name drugs that the companies can patent and sell exclusively for a fixed period of time. Thanks.