Original news and analysis on international IP policy
Three Geneva-based international organisations are continuing their collaboration on issues of health and innovation policy as it cuts across intellectual property rights by planning a 5 July symposium on "changing business models" in medical innovation.
The United States Supreme Court came to a decision yesterday on the case of Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., striking down Myriad’s patent on isolating human genes from the bloodstream.
Poland’s Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski has called on the country’s Ministry of Justice to create and integrate intellectual property courts into the country’s legal system. Under the plan, the new entities would become departments of regular courts, and they would be solely responsible for handling cases involving intellectual property, including disputes related to authors’ rights, trademarks and patents.
The United Nations Human Rights Council today adopted a resolution urging governments to encourage technology development and transfer and to apply intellectual property rights measures in ways that avoid creating barriers to trade in “affordable, safe, efficacious and quality medicines.” The resolution includes references to IP flexibilities in international trade law and to “delinkage” of R&D costs with the price of health products.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has released an updated guidance document on pandemic influenza risk management, which includes the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness (PIP) Framework for the sharing of influenza viruses and access to vaccines and other benefits that was discussed by member states during the 66th World Health Assembly (WHA) in May.
Ten years after applying for membership, Croatia is finally joining the European Union on 1 July 2013. Tanja Rajić, senior associate at PETOSEVIC, explains how six years of accession negotiations and the adoption of the acquis communautaire have affected intellectual property protection in Croatia and prepared it for becoming a member state.
The impact of intellectual property rights on the transfer of ‘green’ technology was brought up to the World Trade Organization committee on intellectual property this week with divided points of view. In addition, a discussion on cost-effective innovation was criticised by some developing countries as side-tracking the committee's objectives, and the European Union's planned revision of its tobacco products directive was disapproved by some producer countries.
World Trade Organization members this week agreed to give least-developed countries an extra eight years to implement international intellectual property protection rules. The decision received a broad support among countries, with some voicing reservations about the negotiation process.
A recent Geneva-based study found that so-called evergreening practices utilised by drug manufacturers are successful in protecting profits by maintaining company market share and offsetting generic competition and cost containment policies.
World Trade Organization members today reached a draft decision on a request put forward by least-developed countries to extend the period during which they do not have to comply with international rules of intellectual property rights protection, according to sources. Under the terms of the hard-fought decision, LDCs can benefit from an extension of eight more years.
Secrecy in trade negotiations and privileged access for business and trade associations does not violate EU law, according to a judgment handed in by the Court of the European Union in Luxembourg today.
During a recent meeting of the World Intellectual Property Organization Committee on Development and Intellectual Property (CDIP), a study on innovation in the informal economy was presented by the organisation's secretariat. The exercise was conducted in an effort to better understand how innovation occurs and how intellectual property is relevant in that context.