Pharmaceutics
No more death by federal red tape
IPN Opinion article
The current system of drug regulation in the USA has led to plummeting innovation, ballooning costs and tragedy for terminal patients who are denied access to experimental drugs. The new FDA commissioner should make reform a priority.
Vested Interests in Deadly Medicines
IPN Opinion article
Counterfeit drugs are flooding into Africa, where up to one in three medicines can be fake, causing widespread suffering and death.
Threat to Modern Medicines
IPN Opinion article
The WHO's plans to push subsidised local drug production in Africa threaten to worsen the problem of substandard generics, placing the most vulnerable at risk.
Populism versus the poor
IPN Opinion article
Innovation by India's internationally competitive scientists suffers because of protectionist policies of the Government, says Roger Bate
Entire intellectual property system could easily fall
IPN Opinion article
Discusses patents, compulsory licensing and trade
Cheap drugs and red herrings
IPN Opinion article
Anyone who believes that overriding patents will magically increase access to drugs should only look at India, where there are over 22,000 generic drug manufacturers, no drug patent laws and yet only a tiny fraction of those who need anti-retroviral therapies get them. Indeed, over 90 per cent of the WHO list of essential medicines are off-patent, and yet these drugs are not delivered to those in need. Poverty, stigmatisation and a lack of health infrastructure are the real barriers - not drug patents.
