[Ip-health] Rep Kucinich - the Case for Public Patents

[Mike Palmedo]

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030707&s=kucinich


    The Case for Public Patents

by DENNIS J. KUCINICH

[posted online on June 19, 2003]

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has stated that it
wants an exclusive patent on the SARS virus to guarantee the discovery
remains in the public domain. That's the right thing to do. In fact, any
eventual vaccine or cure for SARS should also remain in the public
domain so access to affordable treatment is possible in the event of a
public health emergency. If the patent were held in private hands, it
could prevent cooperative efforts among scientists across the globe and
complicate efforts to make treatments or vaccines available to the
public at large.

Despite, or maybe because of these facts, several laboratories have
already filed US patent applications for SARS virus genes, and CDC
director Dr. Julie Gerberding said that more than thirty biomedical
companies have requested SARS viral samples for their efforts to develop
a treatment, vaccine or test. The speed of the patent race is
impressive, but this race for profits isn't good for public health.

What's the danger if private companies hold the patent? Research is
stifled and products are overpriced. Our nation's experience with
prescription drugs should teach us a lesson. We are the only country
that grants monopoly rights in the form of patents without asking for
anything in return, and as a result, American citizens pay twice as much
for the exact same medications as their counterparts across the border.
Now faced with global public-health threats like SARS, we must stop
foolishly pandering to the pharmaceutical industry and demand balance.

I will soon be introducing legislation that would create a new network
of government labs for the research, development and manufacture of
pharmaceutical products and biologics. The labs would be responsible for
developing new cures and bringing them to the American people in a
timely and affordable manner, something that the pharmaceutical industry
has glaringly failed to do. Under the leadership of the National
Institutes of Health, these government labs would receive direction on
public health priorities. Labs would both perform the R&D for new
therapies and cures, and form cooperative agreements with educational,
research and private institutions.

In return for cooperative agreements to perform R&D, all research data
and findings would be made public on a central website, just like the
Human Genome Project. When discoveries are made, the patents would be
held by the government and nonexclusive licenses would be attached to
them. This would allow companies to compete to manufacture
pharmaceutical products, just like generic drug companies do now. This
would radically bring down the cost of drugs. In 2000, if drugs had not
been subject to patent protection, total savings for government and
consumers would have been about $90 billion.

In addition to making new cures affordable for Americans, this proposal
would increase the affordability of cures worldwide. Of the 42 million
people with AIDS around the globe, fewer than 300,000 are receiving
proper treatment. Patents give drug companies monopolies on therapies
and cures, thus allowing prices as high as the market will bear. When
the price is unbearable, as in poor African nations, it can mean a
public health disaster.

Finally, this proposal will improve the quality of R&D by using an "open
source" system that makes data and findings publicly available, instead
of held secret as proprietary data. This will allow us to tap the
collective genius of the world community of scientists. Open source is
how the Linux computer operating system has become a competitive force
against Microsoft's Windows. Anyone can download Linux without
restriction, and many people catch bugs and submit improvements for the
common goal of having the best system for operating our computers.

If smart people across the world do this for computers, can we not do it
for the sake of public health? Over time, we have watched the
pharmaceutical industry fail on three counts: submitting fewer and fewer
drugs to FDA for approval, creating "copycat" drugs instead of truly new
cures and raising drug prices higher every year. Our current patent
system is what encourages artificial improvements and keeps prices high.
It seems clear that one of the keys to public health is establishing
public patents. Let's do it today.