How Can Lower-Income Countries Access COVID-19 Medicines Without Destroying the Patent System? The National Exhaustion Solution
NOPR - NISCAIR Online Periodicals Repository
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Title |
How Can Lower-Income Countries Access COVID-19 Medicines Without Destroying the Patent System? The National Exhaustion Solution
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Creator |
Eldakak, Ahmed
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Subject |
Access to Medicine
Pharmaceutical Patents TRIPS Agreement Exhaustion Pharma Parallel Trade Price Discrimination Arbitrage Generic Medicine Patented Medicine EU Exhaustion Policy |
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Description |
181-189
Many scholars argued that improving access to medicine requires major amendments to the patent system, which is structured according to the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights. This article argues that the argument is not necessarily true. Amending Article 6 of the TRIPS Agreement to adopt a national exhaustion rule for pharmaceutical patents would be sufficient to achieve a considerable improvement in access to medicine while simultaneously strengthening patent protection. This proposal encourages the pharmaceutical industry to adopt a price discrimination policy whereby Pharma would lower medicine prices in the lower-income countries. Accordingly, global access to new medicines such as COVID-19 medicines could be increased as these countries have the majority of poor people. At the same time, Pharma can continue to sell the same medicine in higher-income countries at higher prices, generating sufficient profits to incentivize research and development. |
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Date |
2022-06-29T11:08:02Z
2022-06-29T11:08:02Z 2022-05 |
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Type |
Article
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Identifier |
0975-1076 (Online); 0971-7544 (Print)
http://nopr.niscpr.res.in/handle/123456789/59975 |
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Language |
en
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Publisher |
NIScPR-CSIR, India
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Source |
JIPR Vol.27(3) [May 2022]
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