Pledging intellectual property for COVID-19

Contreras, Jorge L.; Ganz, Ariel B.; Lemley, Mark A.; Molloy, Jenny; Peters, D.M.; Tietze, Frank

doi:10.1038/s41587-020-0682-1

Cited by 33 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…This will entail sharing intellectual property and the technical know-how of manufacturing these vaccines. Some have called for voluntary pledges to share such intellectual property; 9 others, both from governments led by South Africa and India and from civil society groups led by voices from the People's Vaccine Alliance, for a Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) waiver suspending patent rights on COVID-19-related technologies to meet the urgent needs during the pandemic. Forty member states joined Costa Rica in calling on WHO to establish a COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) that would facilitate the voluntary sharing of knowledge, data, and intellectual property needed to accelerate the development of products to address COVID-19.…”

Section: Development and Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Achieving path-dependent equity for global COVID-19 vaccine allocation

Woo

2021

Med

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Section: Development and Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Achieving path-dependent equity for global COVID-19 vaccine allocation

Woo

2021

Med

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“…The C-TAP initiative was launched by the WHO under a global solidarity call for action to tackle COVID-19. Despite WHO backing, at the time of writing, vii vi For a discussion on the distinction between pools/pledges see ref 37 . vii 9 October 2020.…”

Section: Voluntary Licensing Agreements and Global Equitable Accessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Global equitable access to vaccines, medicines and diagnostics for COVID-19: The role of patents as private governance

McMahon

2020

J Med Ethics

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In June 2020, Gilead agreed to provide the USA with 500 000 doses of remdesivir—an antiviral drug which at that time was percieved to show promise in reducing the recovery time for patients with COVID-19. This quantity represented Gilead’s then full production capacity for July and 90% of its capacity for August and September. Similar deals are evident around access to proposed vaccines for COVID-19, and such deals are only likely to increase. These attempts to secure preferential access to medicines and vaccines, so-called vaccine/treatment nationalism, jeopardise supplies of life-saving treatments and vaccines available elsewhere, and jeopardise global equitable distribution of such vaccines/treatments more generally. Much of the focus to date has been on States’ role in negotiating such deals. However, such developments also demonstrate the power patent holders have in controlling access to life-saving healthcare, determining who obtains access first and at what price. This article argues that the extent of control currently given to patent holders for COVID-19 must be questioned. This article demonstrates that patents have significant implications for healthcare acting as private governance tools over patented inventions. It is only by greater probing of patent holders’ role in delivering access to medicines, diagnostics and vaccines for COVID-19 that equitable global equitable access can be achieved.

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“…In a positive response to the great crises of the COVID-19, virtually all innovative technologies have been used in practice, from diagnostics, therapeutic, medical equipment, and vaccine to prevention, tracking, and containment of COVID-19 (Contreras et al, 2020 ). Meanwhile, many health-related technologies protected by patent rights, such as diagnosis, treatments, and vaccines, are called patented health technologies (McMahon, 2020 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A patent pledge generally refers to a public statement and commitment made by patent holders, who are willing to out-license relevant patents to the unrestricted or restricted public under certain conditions or unconditional situations for no monetary or reasonable compensation (Ehrnsperger & Tietze, 2019 ). However, the term "patent pledge" is so vague that it has been labeled diversified labels in the extant literature (Contreras et al, 2020 ), such as non-royalty commitments of patent holders, primary access commitments (Singh, 2018 ). Scholars tend to adopt the patent licensing taxonomy to understand better what patent pledges are.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Pledging Patent Rights for Fighting Against the COVID-19: From the Ethical and Efficiency Perspective

Yuan

2021

J Bus Ethics

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In response to the great crises of the COVID-19 coronavirus, virtually all new technologies protected by patent rights have been used in practice from diagnostics, therapeutic, medical equipment, and vaccine to prevention, tracking, and containment of COVID-19. However, the moral justification of patent rights is questioned when pharmaceutical patents conflict with public health. This paper proposes a revised approach of deciding on how to address the conflicts between business ethics and patent protections and then compares the different mechanisms of clearing patent thickets. Our findings highlight that patent pledges may not only contribute to achieving the maximized substantive justice of the public but also help patent pledgors fulfill procedural justice. The advantages of patent pledges have attracted many patent holders to make public statements during the COVID-19 pandemic. In contrast, the disadvantages of a free license may make patent pledges not sustainable for a long time without the related supporting measures. Our findings will be helpful for policymakers or company managers to make an appropriate decision on rationally utilizing patent portfolios for fighting against public health crises.

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Pledging intellectual property for COVID-19

Cited by 33 publications

References 7 publications

Achieving path-dependent equity for global COVID-19 vaccine allocation

Achieving path-dependent equity for global COVID-19 vaccine allocation

Global equitable access to vaccines, medicines and diagnostics for COVID-19: The role of patents as private governance

Pledging Patent Rights for Fighting Against the COVID-19: From the Ethical and Efficiency Perspective

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