Original news and analysis on international IP policy
A new intergovernmental negotiation, facilitated by the World Health Organization director general, will address an agreement for sharing virus-related materials and benefits and managing associated intellectual property rights in the WHO strategy for responding to pandemic influenza outbreaks.
The first public discussion of an expert report on how to finance the often costly process of research and development to create new medicines, vaccines and diagnostics needed by the poor to address diseases that disproportionately effect them began this week at the World Health Organization. There were immediate concerns about the last-minute release of the report’s full text and concerns from several governments that it came up short on critical areas, and it was decided that an informal consultation process will take place over the next few months. Meanwhile, World Health Organization Director General Margaret Chan said she has already begun an investigation to find out who leaked drafts of the expert group’s work to an international industry group in December.
The World Health Organization today declared it will launch a review of the global – including its own - response to the H1N1 swine influenza epidemic, as questions swirl around whether the UN agency trumped up the importance of H1N1. The WHO also faces charges this week that it has acted without transparency and inclusiveness in leading a process to find alternative financing for research and development into medicines for diseases occurring predominately in developing countries.
Finding financing to develop medicines for under-researched diseases, regulatory harmonisation, and pandemic influenza preparedness will top the agenda at next week’s World Health Organization Executive Board meeting.
联合援助国际药品采购机制（UNITAID，以下简称「联合援助」）执行理事会在十二月通过一项专利药品库的实施计划，藉以刺激开发中国家对重要药品之研究，并增加取得管道。根据联合援助表示，这个专利药品库将在2010年中开始运作；该组织并已选定十九种产品可望纳入药品库，同时还继续跟药厂协商，期能达成协议，让仿制药厂得以生产比较廉价的版本。
The European Union appears to be preparing for adoption of the "gold standard" of enforcement, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), as intellectual property law expert Annette Kur from the Max Planck Institute of Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law said it is now called.
Recent customs seizures by some European Union members of Indian-made generic drugs en route to Latin America have caused uproar amongst development NGOs. But their claims are not only wide of the mark but dangerous, say Philip Stevens and Julian Harris.
The issue of counterfeit and substandard medicines is again not on the agenda of the World Health Organization Executive Board meeting in January, though sources say member states are being consulted about the issue by the secretariat.
The World Health Organization secretariat has released its report to the executive board meeting on pandemic influenza preparedness. A framework for handling outbreaks of potentially pandemic influenza was approved in May this year, but outstanding – and critical - elements of the framework remained unfinished.
Implementation of a United Nations-related patent pool initiative that independent reviewers say could save millions of lives (and dollars) is set to be approved next week by the initiative’s board, though some observers fear resistance from strong patent beneficiaries, such as the foundation run by Microsoft founder Bill Gates. A confidential report on the initiative prepared for board approval is expected to show multiple benefits to implementation of the pool, but also some concerns, according to informed sources.
Le groupe d’experts sur les financements innovants pour la recherche et le développement, réuni sous les auspices de l'Organisation mondiale de la Santé (OMS), a tenu sa troisième et dernière réunion du 30 novembre au 2 décembre. Le rapport de ce comité très secret devrait être communiqué aux Etats membres dans les semaines qui viennent, selon certaines sources.
Confidential documents related to the World Health Organization Expert Working Group on innovative financing for research and development surfaced today, revealing the group’s thinking as well as pharmaceutical industry thinking about the WHO process. The documents immediately raised concern about possible undue access to the process by industry, but the WHO told Intellectual Property Watch the industry group was not supposed to have them.