Original news and analysis on international IP policy
The Geneva Health Forum (GHF), taking place on 15-17 April in Geneva, will discuss the theme “Global Health: Interconnected Challenges, Integrated Solutions.” This year’s forum aims to encourage an “integrative approach” to global health, “which better captures the underlying causes of ill-health and recognises the commonalities that underlie people’s health around the world,” says GHF.
ames Anaya, United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, today called on the owners of the Washington Redskins Football team to recognise that the name ‘Redskins’ constitutes a “hurtful reminder” of the “long history of mistreatment of Native American people in the United States.”
The explosive growth of technology in recent years has given governments, intelligence agencies and big businesses, like Google and Facebook, monitoring tools to create a new empire of Big Brother. People have never been more scrutinised at any other time in human history than they are today. This naturally begs the question: does the right to privacy still exist?
European data retention has to be rolled back after a clear judgment of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice in Luxemburg today.
The highest EU Court ruled that the directive which obliges telecommunication providers to collect and store communication traffic and location data for up to 2 years, depending on the implementation in the member states, is invalid.
The Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) this week announced two new licencing agreements with the private sector joint venture ViiV Healthcare that will increase access to a new antiretroviral in countries hardest hit by HIV.
The Committee of Permanent Representatives of the European Union recently approved a compromise proposal by the Greek presidency, setting up a decision on the EU Council’s signing later this month of the Marrakesh Treaty on access to books for blind and visually impaired persons. However, some EU members raised that the treaty lies within a shared competency between the EU and its member states.
In a new book presented last week at the World Intellectual Property Organisation, an optimistic British economist suggests a shift in the way we think about global development by overcoming income as a unique indicator to evaluate worldwide progress.
A much-discussed new United Nations report on climate change addresses intellectual property issues and the role of innovation in developing technology and disseminate knowledge for local adaption to climate change.
When “Innocence of Muslims” first appeared online, the video provoked outrage among millions of Muslims around the world. Now the consternation has spread to many copyright experts, internet firms, news organisations, and entertainment companies, who assert that a recent 9th Circuit decision about the movie makes a major change in US copyright law, with terrible consequences for the internet, media, and free speech. Others state that the ruling makes no change at all in US law.
As bacteria become more and more resistant to existing medicines, product pipelines are drying up. A solution may lie in a forgotten therapy developed in 1917, the use of which has been restricted to certain parts of Eastern Europe ever since the discovery and universal use of antibiotics. But business models and intellectual property regimes need to change to provide incentives for research and development in this area.