Student guide International Program A.Y. 2005/06

Globalization, Property Rights And Pharmaceutical Industry
Lesson timetable, Notice board, Additional material
Lecturers
CAPRI STEFANO
Aim of the course
The aim of this course it to introduce students to the economics of pharmaceutical markets and related policies that affect national and international markets broadly, as well as those affecting certain actors within these markets specifically. On the one hand, patents (exclusive rights over their innovation) provide a means for companies to reap some economic benefit from them. On the other hand, the monopolistic power can produce inefficiency in the market and also inequality, particularly when the objective is to sold drugs for people affected by some disease. Two main topics will be addressed: the cost of R&D and patenting protection in the new biotech era; the globalization of the production and the inequitable distribution of drugs in the world (the case of AIDS in developing countries), in search for the equity-efficiency balance.
Syllabus
Overview of the market for pharmaceuticals.
· The economics of the pharmaceutical industry (the demand for pharmaceuticals, pharmaceutical prices, patent protection, public and private intervention in the pharmaceutical market).
· The multinational pharmaceutical industry and the globalization of the R&D.
· The revolution in the drug discovery: pharmacogenetics and pharmacogenomics.
· The role of patents in the quest for affordable access to drugs (competition, patent protection, cost of therapies). The case of India's Patents Third Amendment Bill, 2005.
· Conflicts between health and economic/industrial goals. The case of AIDS: how to provide life-long antiretroviral treatment to people living with HIV/AIDS in poor countries.
· Globalization, public policies, TRIPS and access to drugs.
Examinations
1 hour written exam.
Reading list
Alsegård E (2004) Global pharmaceutical patents after the Doha Declaration – What lies in the future? 1:1 SCRIPT-ed 4, @: http://www.law.ed.ac.uk/ahrb/script-ed/docs/doha.asp>
Scherer FM (2003) The Economics of Compulsory Drug Patent Licensing, World Bank Paper.
Gersovitz M and Hammer JS (2003) Infectious Diseases, Public Policy, and the Marriage of Economics and Epidemiology. World Bank Res. Obs., 18:129-157.
Scherer FM (2001) The link between gross profits and pharmaceutical R&D spending. Health Affairs, 20:216-220.