Intellectual property framework responses to health emergencies – options for Africa

Intellectual Property and the Right to Health

This paper deals with the subject of the various relations existing between intellectual property and the right to health. Reference will be made, within the industrial property system, especially to patents, as a crucial instrument in the development of the pharmaceutical industry, which in turn has afforded the world’s population greater and better access to health systems. Clearly therefore,...

Health and intellectual property rights.

A new and comprehensive treaty on intellectual property rights was established in 1994, within the framework of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It is called the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights-the TRIPS agreement for short. It requires all WTO member countries to adopt in their laws minimum standards of protection for patents, trademarks, copyrights and ot...

Intellectual property and public health.

It is appropriate that this issue of the Bulletin coincides with the report of the WHO Commission on Intellectual Property and Innovation in Health (CIPIH).1 Developing health technolog gies for the world’s poor people increasg ingly requires the wise management of intellectual property (IP), and the papers in this issue all treat IP as a strategic asset. Vaccines, DNA patenting, and the innova...

International intellectual property, access to health care, and human rights: South Africa v. United States.

Does Intellectual Property Lead to Intellectual Property Protection?

Researchers studying the differential commitment of countries to intellectual property rights, often appear to run into the claim that countries with a relatively higher and significantly changing technological base (the developed countries) opt for relatively stronger protection, whereas those with a relatively low and essentially unchanging technological base (the developing countries) opt fo...