Editing Medication (section)

===Access to medicines and drug pricing===
{{Main|Essential medicines|Societal views on patents}}

Essential medicines, as defined by the [[World Health Organization]] (WHO), are "those drugs that satisfy the health care needs of the majority of the population; they should therefore be available at all times in adequate amounts and in appropriate dosage forms, at a price the community can afford."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Js4875e/5.2.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140201194528/http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Js4875e/5.2.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=1 February 2014 |title=The Selection and Use of Essential Medicines – WHO Technical Report Series, No. 914: 4. Other outstanding technical issues: 4.2 Description of essential medicines |publisher=Apps.who.int |date=14 April 2016 |access-date=25 June 2016}}</ref>  Recent studies have found that most of the medicines on the WHO essential medicines list, outside of the field of HIV drugs, are not patented in the developing world, and that lack of widespread [[Access to medicines|access to these medicines]] arise from issues fundamental to economic development – lack of infrastructure and poverty.<ref>{{cite web |first=Stanley P |last=Kowalksy |date=2013 |url=http://www.accesstopharmaceuticals.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Kowalski.pdf |title=Patent Landscape Analysis of Healthcare Innovations |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304025500/http://www.accesstopharmaceuticals.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Kowalski.pdf |archive-date=4 March 2016 |url-status=dead |work=The Franklin Pierce Center for Intellectual Property |publisher=University of New Hampshire School of Law }}</ref> [[Médecins Sans Frontières]] also runs a [[Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines]] campaign, which includes advocacy for greater resources to be devoted to currently untreatable diseases that primarily occur in the developing world. The [[Access to Medicine Index]] tracks how well pharmaceutical companies make their products available in the developing world.{{cn|date=May 2023}}

[[World Trade Organization]] negotiations in the 1990s, including the [[TRIPS Agreement]] and the [[Doha Declaration on the TRIPS agreement and public health|Doha Declaration]], have centered on issues at the intersection of international trade in pharmaceuticals and [[intellectual property rights]], with developed world nations seeking strong intellectual property rights to protect investments made to develop new drugs, and developing world nations seeking to promote their generic pharmaceuticals industries and their ability to make medicine available to their people via [[compulsory licenses]].

Some have raised ethical objections specifically with respect to pharmaceutical patents and the high prices for drugs that they enable their proprietors to charge, which poor people around the world, cannot afford.<ref name="Banta, D.H. 2001">{{cite journal | author = Banta D.H. | year = 2001 | title = Worldwide Interest in Global Access to Drugs | journal = Journal of the American Medical Association | volume = 285 | issue = 22| pages = 2844–46 | pmid = 11401589 | doi=10.1001/jama.285.22.2844-JMN0613-3-1}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | author = Ferreira L | year = 2002 | title = Access to Affordable HIV/AIDS Drugs: The Human Rights Obligations of Multinational Pharmaceutical Corporations | url = http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3874&context=flr&sei-redir=1& | journal = Fordham Law Review | volume = 71 | issue = 3 | pages = 1133–79 | pmid = 12523370 | access-date = 20 January 2014 | archive-date = 1 April 2014 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140401205420/http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3874&context=flr&sei-redir=1& | url-status = live }}</ref> Critics also question the rationale that exclusive patent rights and the resulting high prices are required for pharmaceutical companies to recoup the large investments needed for research and development.<ref name="Banta, D.H. 2001"/> One study concluded that marketing expenditures for new drugs often doubled the amount that was allocated for research and development.<ref>{{cite journal | author1 = Barton J.H. | author2 = Emanuel E.J. | year = 2005 | title = The Patents-Based Pharmaceutical Development Process: Rationale, Problems and Potential Reforms | journal = Journal of the American Medical Association | volume = 294 | issue = 16 | pages = 2075–82 | pmid = 16249422 | doi = 10.1001/jama.294.16.2075 | s2cid = 10277752 }}</ref> Other critics claim that patent settlements would be costly for consumers, the health care system, and state and federal governments because it would result in delaying access to lower cost generic medicines.<ref>{{cite web|title = Misguided Policy on Patents|url = http://www.gphaonline.org/gpha-media/press/gpha-ftc-misguided-policy-on-patentsettlements|publisher = Generic Pharmaceutical Association (GPhA)|access-date = 8 October 2015|archive-date = 28 September 2015|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150928124131/http://www.gphaonline.org/gpha-media/press/gpha-ftc-misguided-policy-on-patentsettlements|url-status = live}}</ref>

[[Novartis]] fought a protracted battle with the government of India over the patenting of its drug, [[Gleevec]], in India, which ended up in a Supreme Court in a case known as [[Novartis v. Union of India & Others]].  The Supreme Court ruled narrowly against Novartis, but opponents of patenting drugs claimed it as a major victory.<ref>Charlotte Harrison [http://www.nature.com/nrd/journal/v12/n5/pdf/nrd4007.pdf?WT.ec_id=NRD-201305 Patent watch] Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 12, 336–337 (2013)</ref>