Pharmaceutical Patents Benefit Latin American Patients
Pierre Verstraete
February 5, 2008
Latin America has room for improvement in fostering environments where intellectual property is respected, particularly with regard to patented pharmaceuticals. On many occasions, in fact, countries still reward the copying of patented drugs rather than the development of innovative life-saving medicines. Pharmaceutical innovation, however, is undeniably in the interest of Latin America and its patients, and countries in the region should take concrete steps to create the conditions that foster it, including strong and effective intellectual property protection.
Already a success story is Mexico, which has greatly benefited from the intellectual property protection provided through the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Today, Mexico is the leading pharmaceutical market in the region. In part, owing to Mexico’s decision to protect intellectual property, pharmaceutical patents and foreign direct investment in the pharmaceutical sector have grown and are expected to grow further.
Strong patent and data protection for pharmaceuticals is good for patients and important for research-based companies like Schering-Plough Corporation. New medicines are developed and medical breakthroughs occur when companies take large and enormously expensive risks. By providing a limited period during which our products may not be copied, intellectual property protection gives Schering-Plough and its investors the incentive to take those big risks. This is the engine that propelled some of the great advances in human health in this century, including treatments for deadly infections, heart disease and cancer.
This engine also drives Latin America’s home-grown industries that rely on intellectual property protection for risky investments. Local pharmaceutical companies use the incentives afforded by strong patents and effective data protection to overcome the risks inherent in the development of innovative drugs. For instance, the medicinal properties of the flora and fauna in Brazil’s tropical forests were well-known long before Brazil’s decision to strengthen intellectual property protection in the mid-1990s. But it was only with the introduction of such protection that Brazilian researchers felt secure enough to take the risks that resulted in innovative, patent-protected biomedical products developed in Brazil for global use—a good result for Brazilian companies, the Brazilian economy, and Brazilian patients alike.
Read the rest of this article on the benefits of pharmaceutical patents.
