[Ip-health] [Economic Times] Allow incremental patents

[Achal Prabhala]

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Allow incremental patents


TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2007 02:35:23 AM]

Plagiarism is more a sin than a crime. The Mashelkar Committee on the Paten=
t Act admits that =93eight to ten lines=94 of its 56-page report are verbat=
im reproductions from a paper by an independent charitable British organisa=
tion that does research on intellectual property issues. That research was =
funded by an association of pharma companies. The committee has asked the r=
eport be withdrawn, and a fresh report be submitted within three months.

Inevitably, people will speculate that drug MNCs have unduly influenced the=
 committee. Predictably, the CPM has jumped into the fray and asked for the=
 report to be junked. The committee had a limited brief. It was asked to as=
sess whether India=92s patent laws were TRIPS-compatible. The first was whe=
ther only new chemical entities could qualify for patents, or also lesser i=
nnovations. The second was whether micro-organisms could be excluded from p=
atents. The committee concluded that TRIPS required both incremental and mi=
cro-organism patents. For this conclusion, it didn=92t need plagiarised quo=
tations. Clearly, the committee is guilty of cavalier lack of application. =
But nothing so far suggests it is guilty of being unduly influenced by MNCs=
.

International practice varies on incremental innovations other than new che=
mical entities. MNCs have sometimes attempted evergreening of patents: when=
 a patent on a drug is about to expire, they try to patent a new combinatio=
n or dosage of the same drug. To stop this, many NGOs want patents limited =
to new molecules alone. However, most countries permit incremental innovati=
ons provided these pass the usual tests for patentability. Indian drug comp=
anies with strong R&D want incremental patents. Other Indian companies that=
 specialise in generic drugs oppose them.

Drawing a balance between the interests of affected groups, and keeping in =
mind the vital issue of affordable access to drugs by the common man, the c=
ommittee suggests incremental innovations should be patentable, subject to =
stringent rules that thwart evergreening and frivolous patenting. Also, if =
incremental patenting is allowed, an Indian company can patent an improved =
version of an expensive drug patented by a global MNC. This will break the =
latter=92s monopoly and allow the Indian drug to compete at a lower price. =
Thus incremental patents can improve rather than reduce consumer access to =
cheaper drugs.
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