The IP-skeptic activist groups took it on the chin last week, as their plans for socializing the intellectual property (IP) system hit a setback.
For those of you new to the IP policy battles, several activist NGOs (non-governmental organizations) with a socialist world view are trying to undermine the international IP system, as they see intellectual property as a public good, something that belongs to the entire public—regardless of who invents it or who pays for the development of that IP.
And so for several years they have worked within the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in an effort to weaken IP standards, especially on pharmaceuticals.
Their argument, all the evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, is that pharmaceutical patents undermine access to needed drugs in poor countries. If developing nations could ignore those patents, they say, buying the drugs from some generic manufacturer (often tied to the government that breaks the patent), all the poor’s health problems would be solved.
Well, that’s a bit of an overstatement, but you get the point.
Demonstrating their ability to multitask, the activists have lately begun working to enlist the World Health Organization (WHO) in their campaign to delegitimize intellectual property.
Which makes some strategic sense from their standpoint. The WHO, in contrast with WIPO, has no expertise in IP; its mission is to address health care needs, not IP policy. So working through the WHO to achieve the NGOs’ ends might be a more fruitful path for their radical agenda.
Hence, the creation of the WHO’s Intergovernmental Working Group (IGWG) on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property, which met in Geneva the last week of April. The question being raised is whether changes are needed in the drug-development process (i.e., elimination of patents) in order to address the needs of the poor in developing countries.
IPI was there, hosting a morning briefing to discuss some of the critical issues surrounding the importance of IP rights to innovation technology transfer.
The meeting concluded on May 3 having reached consensus on a number of statements in a joint declaration, but no consensus was reached on the most potentially damaging ideas.
Which is a good thing, of course, but it’s clear that a number of the IP-skeptic NGOs were terribly disappointed that the IGWG did not validate their radical agenda.
From our standpoint, the IGWG conceded some statements that could come back to haunt the world’s innovation system.
But the good news is that the IGWG did not adopt the radical agenda that the activist NGOs had hoped. The bad news is they will be back again, next week, at the WHO’s World Health Assembly, to try again.