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Promising Trends in Access to Medicines
Author(s) -
Richard Gold E.,
Morin JeanFrédéric
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
global policy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.602
H-Index - 33
eISSN - 1758-5899
pISSN - 1758-5880
DOI - 10.1111/j.1758-5899.2011.00110.x
Subject(s) - developing country , business , context (archaeology) , language change , access to medicines , intellectual property , principal (computer security) , market access , economic growth , economics , political science , computer security , art , paleontology , ecology , literature , computer science , law , biology , agriculture
It is a vast understatement to say that the problem of access to medicines in developing countries is complex. Access is limited by a range of factors including inability to pay, a lack of infrastructure, and corruption in some countries. Surrounding and exacerbating these structural and technological problems is the layer of legal rights created by patents and their licensing that complicate and render more expensive the preparation and delivery of needed medicines, particularly those that need to be adapted to the social, health and cultural environment of developing countries. This article provides a survey of innovative strategies that aim at maximizing the potential of patents to facilitate the development and delivery of medicines against diseases, the burden of which falls principally on developing country populations. To understand the context in which these strategies are being proposed and implemented, the article reviews the battles over access to medicines beginning in the late 1980s. It then surveys some of the principal suggestions put forward to better direct innovation systems in addressing the critical health needs of the world’s majority including advance market commitments, patent buy‐outs, prize funds, public–private partnerships and patent pools.