Should the TRIPS Agreement be re-visited and amended and why?

Question

The WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), negotiated in the 1986-94 Uruguay Round, introduced intellectual property rules into the multilateral trading system for the first time. The Agreement gives owners of intellectual property rights the right to prevent others from using their inventions, designs or other creations — and to use that right to negotiate payment in return for others using them.

The TRIPS Agreement was initially an attempt to narrow the gaps in the intellectual property rights around the world, and to bring them under common international rules. However commentators argue that the Agreement does not benefit developing countries especially in the aspect of patent protection for pharmaceutical products. They argue that it prevents people in poor countries from having access to medicines; hence the Agreement says patent protection must be available for inventions for at least 20 years.

Answer 1

Obviously all international treaties should be constantly reviewed and, if necessary, revised, but I dont see any particular reason to adapt the TRIPs agreement at the present time.

The situation in the pharmaceutical industry is essentially quite simple: patent rights entitle the patent owner to demand payment in return for medicines which they develop, and certain developing countries lack the financial resources to purchase these medicines.

The purpose of a patent is to provide the "inventor" of a product or process with a (usually) 20 year monopoly for that product, this monopoly being the incentive for doing the research that led to the invention. In the pharmaceutical industry, a staggering amount of investment is required to research, develop, trial, and gain marketing approval for drugs. Without patents, competitors would be able to step in and manufacture these drugs without this investment, enabling them to seriously undercut the original developer. In short, without patents, R&D in the pharmaceutical industry would virtually stop. I dont know about you,but I quite fancy the idea of a cure for cancer one day...

Rather than crippling intellectual property rights, I think we should focus on helping developing countries to gain the capability to afford to buy the drugs legitimately.