Twenty years ago, the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) set international standards to protect intellectual property. The TRIPS Agreement brought about significant changes to intellectual property, with far-reaching implications for the pharmaceutical sector.
During the 2015 WTO Public Forum, on 2 October Trade Works, UNAIDS, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), the People’s Health Movement and the Third World Network held a session to discuss developments that have taken place since the TRIPS Agreement was adopted and its impact on accessing medicines in the developing world.
The challenges and opportunities in the public health context were explored during the event. Mariangela Simão, Director of Rights, Gender, Prevention and Community Mobilization at UNAIDS, highlighted the importance of discussing access to medicines under the framework of the recently approved Sustainable Development Goals. “The global community needs to find a balanced intellectual property regimen that works for the achievement of the health targets, including access to innovation, as recommended by the Global Commission on HIV and the Law,” said Ms Simão.
The participants discussed the outcomes of the use of the 2001 WTO Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health—a landmark achievement for lessening the impact of intellectual property protection on public health. According to Ellen ‘t Hoen, the use of some mechanisms provided in the Doha Declaration “have helped international agencies like UNICEF and UNITAID to procure affordable generic drugs for least developed countries without any legal impediment, since such countries are benefiting from a TRIPS waiver for pharmaceutical products.”
Preserving the policy spaces paved by the Doha Declaration for the least developed countries will be one of the central issues to be addressed at the upcoming TRIPS Council meeting to be held later this month in Geneva, Switzerland.
Despite the opportunities presented by the flexibilities within the TRIPS Agreement, countries still face difficulties when trying to implement them. New provisions in bilateral and regional free-trade agreements that go beyond what is established under TRIPS are making the policy spaces for the use of such flexibilities even stricter.
The participants also examined intellectual property trends in promoting innovation within the health sector since the adoption of the TRIPS Agreement. Hu Yuanqiong, Legal and Policy Advisor, MSF Access Campaign, noted that the current “patent-centric research and development model is not working to address the health needs, including for people living in the developed world, since the new treatments for hepatitis C and other noncommunicable diseases are simply unaffordable.”
