Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- PART I International Provision of Public Goods under a Globalized Intellectual Property Regime
- PART II Innovation and Technology Transfer in a Protectionist Environment
- PART III Sectoral Issues: Essential Medicines and Traditional Knowledge
- 15 Managing the Hydra: The Herculean Task of Ensuring Access to Essential Medicines
- 16 Theory and Implementation of Differential Pricing for Pharmaceuticals
- 17 Increasing R&D Incentives for Neglected Diseases: Lessons from the Orphan Drug Act
- Comment: Access to Essential Medicines – Promoting Human Rights Over Free Trade and Intellectual Property Claims
- 18 Legal and Economic Aspects of Traditional Knowledge
- 19 Saving the Village: Conserving Jurisprudential Diversity in the International Protection of Traditional Knowledge
- 20 Legal Perspectives on Traditional Knowledge: The Case for Intellectual Property Protection
- Comment: Traditional Knowledge, Folklore and the Case for Benign Neglect
- 21 Protecting Cultural Industries to Promote Cultural Diversity: Dilemmas for International Policymaking Posed by the Recognition of Traditional Knowledge
- PART IV Reform and Regulation Issues
- Index
17 - Increasing R&D Incentives for Neglected Diseases: Lessons from the Orphan Drug Act
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- PART I International Provision of Public Goods under a Globalized Intellectual Property Regime
- PART II Innovation and Technology Transfer in a Protectionist Environment
- PART III Sectoral Issues: Essential Medicines and Traditional Knowledge
- 15 Managing the Hydra: The Herculean Task of Ensuring Access to Essential Medicines
- 16 Theory and Implementation of Differential Pricing for Pharmaceuticals
- 17 Increasing R&D Incentives for Neglected Diseases: Lessons from the Orphan Drug Act
- Comment: Access to Essential Medicines – Promoting Human Rights Over Free Trade and Intellectual Property Claims
- 18 Legal and Economic Aspects of Traditional Knowledge
- 19 Saving the Village: Conserving Jurisprudential Diversity in the International Protection of Traditional Knowledge
- 20 Legal Perspectives on Traditional Knowledge: The Case for Intellectual Property Protection
- Comment: Traditional Knowledge, Folklore and the Case for Benign Neglect
- 21 Protecting Cultural Industries to Promote Cultural Diversity: Dilemmas for International Policymaking Posed by the Recognition of Traditional Knowledge
- PART IV Reform and Regulation Issues
- Index
Summary
Introduction
A number of studies point to the fact that new medicines have been a key factor underlying the substantial gains in longevity and quality of life realized by individuals over the last half century. A recent survey by David Cutler and Mark McClellan analyzed the degree of medical progress in a number of major diseases. They found pharmaceutical innovations have provided significant net benefits to patients across a wide spectrum of conditions, such as heart disease, cancer, and depression. These are diseases that are common to both developed and developing countries (i.e. “global diseases”). However, a review of the existing literature indicates relatively fewer R&D investment programs and medical advances devoted to diseases that are specific to and concentrated in developing countries. This would include infectious and tropical diseases, such as malaria, tuberculosis and leprosy, which afflict millions of individuals.
The basic challenge to stimulating more research and development on new medicines for these neglected diseases is how to overcome the barriers posed by the low income and ability to pay for health care that exists in developing countries. Insufficient revenues on the demand side of the market are combined with high fixed costs of R&D on the supply side. From a policy perspective, one needs to design government interventions that will alter the economic incentives that prevail in this situation.
The U.S. Orphan Drug Act of 1983 provides an instructive model in this case.
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- International Public Goods and Transfer of Technology Under a Globalized Intellectual Property Regime , pp. 457 - 480Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
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