Impact of Patents on Pharmaceutical Companies and Public Health: Critical Study

Abstract

This paper undertakes a review of available studies to provide a perspective on the role of Intellectual Property (IP) protection in developing health care innovations in India. The relevant literature in the context of India has followed two strands: some studies focus on the implications of the new IP regime on access to health care, while others explore the implications of IP on innovation in general and medical innovation in particular. 1.product innovations in drugs; 2.process innovations in pharmaceutical industry; 3.new drug delivery mechanisms, bio-enhancers that improve bio-availability/efficacy and dosage forms; 4.product innovations in medical equipment and devices; 5.innovations in the delivery of health services; and 6.Policy innovations to enhance access to health care. “It is not always possible to attribute all the aforementioned changes to the change in the IP regime as firms and governments strategically innovate for a variety of reasons. However, in this review, we focus on two types of “innovative responses” that may affect health care access and innovation, as these may be, at least partly, a response to the changes in the IP regime”: 1.Changes in innovation inputs and outputs, reviewing studies that capture implications of IP for changes in research and development (R&D), technology licensing/collaboration, patents, and other innovations at the firm level. 2.Institutional/policy innovations in the health care sector to provide better access to health care. For the purpose of this article, all policy experiments in this space are seen as ‘innovative’ even though these may not be globally ‘novel’. The following section provides a broad overview of the Indian pharmaceutical industry and health care provision in India. The “Changes in the IP regime and IP policy innovations” section briefly discusses the changes in IP policy in recent years to help appreciate other policy and health-related innovations. The subsequent three sections summarize the insights from the literature and available evidence on the two dimensions described earlier. The final section concludes the review.