Report Suggests Patent Laws Stifling Biotech Innovation

by Glen Shapiro, LawAndTax-News.com, New York

10 September 2008

A Canadian led study, published this week, has suggested that the rush amongst pharmaceutical firms to patent new drugs, plants and technologies is stifling innovation in the biotechnology industry, to the increasing detriment of developing countries.

The report, which represented the culmination of a seven year review, was published by the International Expert Group on Biotechnology, Innovation and Intellectual Property on Tuesday, via The Innovation Partnership, a non-profit consulting firm based in Montreal.

It argued that:

"The world’s intellectual property system is broken. It’s stopping lifesaving technologies from reaching the people who need them most in developed and developing countries."

“We found the same stumbling blocks in the traditional communities of Brazil as we did in a corporate boardroom,” explained Richard Gold, professor of intellectual property at McGill University and chair of the International Expert Group that produced the report.

“Most striking is that no matter where we looked, the lack of trust played a vital role in blocking negotiations that could have benefited both sides, as well as the larger public.”

“For better or for worse, biotechnology is at the heart of current debates about health care, the environment, food and development,” Gold continued. “It offers the promise of producing plants to resist drought and nourish the world’s poor, and to offer new medicines and energy sources. Biotech is at the heart of not only today’s economy but its security and well-being as well.”

The report argues that there is currently a "fixation on patents and privately-controlled research", arguing that this has frequently given rise to controversy and roadblocks to innovation. It cited as examples: "the USD612mn patent suit that almost shut down the world’s Blackberries; Myriad Genetics’ inability to introduce its breast cancer screening test in Canada and Europe; a pharmaceutical industry with an increasingly bare medicine cabinet; an ongoing failure to deliver life-saving medications to developing countries".

The Expert Group went on to suggest that:

"The best innovative activity occurs when everyone – researchers, companies, governments and NGOs – works together to ensure that new ideas reach the public, but are appropriately regulated and efficiently delivered to those who need them."

“The end of our old way of doing business does not mean we don’t need a system for protecting intellectual knowledge,” Gold observed, continuing:

“We need an IP system that will support collaborations among researchers and partners in industry and academia worldwide so that knowledge gets to those who need it most. This means the laws may have to be changed, but more importantly, it means that we have a lot of work to do to change behaviors and build trust among all the players. How people behave – in other words, their practices – and the effect of practices on innovation is critical. Public and private institutions – patent offices, courts, universities, governments, corporations and industry groups – that manage, award, review and hold intellectual property also play an essential role in shaping the IP system.”

Recommendations contained in the report, which was titled 'Toward a New Era of Intellectual Property: From Confrontation to Negotiation', included that:

• Governments should:
  - Seek other ways to encourage innovation—not just IP — health and environmental regulations, the judicial system and tax rules, for instance.
  - Work with industry to help create respected and trusted entities whose members that can be counted on to mediate disputes fairly and encourage indigenous and local communities in policy development.
  - Develop Public-Private Partnerships to conduct early stage research including through the sharing of health related data to allow the sharing of risk across industry.
• Patent offices should:
  - Collect standardized patent-related information, including license data as they are doing in Japan.
  - Assist developing countries and NGOs in finding out which patents exist in order to enable licensing.
• Industry should:
  - Establish an independent, non-profit technology assessment organization to evaluate new biotechnology products from developing countries.
  - Participate actively in the creation of Public-Private Partnerships and other collaborative mechanisms.
  - Be transparent about patent holdings.
  - Develop new business models that promote partnerships and collaborations.
• Universities should:
  - Develop clear principles relating to the use and dissemination of intellectual property and promote greater access and broad licensing.
  - Develop measures of the success of transfer of technology based on social returns rather than on the number of patents held
  - Enter into collaborations between developed and developing countries to ensure that developing country doctoral and post-doctoral students have opportunities to study and work at home.

Recommended