E-DRUG: WHO welcomes first NIH contribution to Medicines Patent Pool
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Dear e-druggers,
On behalf of the World Health Organization I would like to inform you
that WHO welcomes the announcement that the National Institute of Health
(NIH) of the United States of America has become the first patent holder
over HIV medicines to contribute to the newly established Medicines
Patent Pool.
Under the Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health,
Innovation and Intellectual Property (adopted at the sixty-first World
Health Assembly in 2008), the WHO has been mandated to "examine the
feasibility of voluntary patent pools of upstream and downstream
technologies to promote innovation of and access to health products and
medical devices." We think that the Medicines Patent Pool is an
important initiative towards achieving universal access to the newer HIV
medicines. In 2009 WHO's Expert Committee on the Selection and Use of
Essential Medicines, which updates every two years the influential WHO
Model List of Essential Medicines, has identified a number of missing
fixed-dose combinations of essential medicines for the second-line
treatment of AIDS. One of the new antiretroviral medicines identified by
WHO, darunavir, is among the medicines for which the NIH has made the
patent available for use within the pool. Paving the way for the
development and subsequent prequalifiaction of new fixed-dose
combinations through the Medicines Patent Pool will facilitate patient
adherence to the treatment and will also help prevent the use of
resistance to darunavir. At WHO we will be plased to give priority to
any of the newly developed FDCs for assessment by our WHO / UN
Prequalification Programme in order to facilitate its rapid uptake by
the funding agencies and national governments.
With best regards,
Dr Hans V. Hogerzeil
Director
Essential Medicines and Pharmaceutical Policies
World Health Organization
CH-1211 Geneva 27
Switzerland
Tel: +41-22-791-3528
Fax: +41-22-791-4730
email: hogerzeilh@who.int