In what he described as a great “public health victory,” the World Trade Organization has ruled that Australia’s plain packaging requirements for tobacco products did not infringe on international trade, said the World Health Organization Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Wednesday. The decision by the WTO on Tuesday comes just as it also opened […] Continue reading ->
World Health Organization member states were close to an agreement Wednesday evening on a European Union-led draft resolution on global COVID-19 response to the upcoming World Health Assembly. If approved, it would pave the way for coordinated planning by the global health community to ensure wide and equitable access by people worldwide to COVID-19 medicines […] Continue reading ->
As the 73rd World Health Assembly approaches, the European Union-sponsored draft resolution on the COVID-19 response is gathering steam and storm as it rolls closer to the planned opening of the Assembly on 18 May – with far less clarity about how it might actually hit the shores of the public debate.  The resolution aims […] Continue reading ->
The World Trade Organization’s director general Roberto Azevêdo announced on Tuesday that he was suspending all WTO meetings at its Geneva offices, following the confirmation of a COVID-19 case among staff. It was the first publicly-announced case of the novel coronavirus infection at a Geneva-based United Nations or UN-affiliated organization since the epidemic began, which […] Continue reading ->
Cutting-edge health technologies – such as gene editing therapies for cancer – have the potential to save lives, and the international intellectual property system should be leveraged to drive innovation and bring those therapies to people who need them, said the leaders of global health, trade and intellectual property agencies at a Trilateral Symposium on […] Continue reading ->
Dr Carlos Maria Correa, an Argentinian economist and lawyer, is globally renowned for his expertise on international trade, intellectual property, health, technology transfer, investment policy and especially their impact on developing countries. He has authored several books and academic articles and been a visiting professor at several universities. Additionally, he has consulted with many United Nations agencies, the World Bank, and other regional and international organisations and has advised several governments on intellectual property, innovation policy and public health. Correa was a member of the UK Commission on Intellectual Property, of the Commission on Intellectual Property, Innovation and Public Health established by the World Health Assembly and of the FAO Panel of Eminent Experts on Ethics in Food and Agriculture. Currently, he is the Director of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies on Industrial Property and Economics Law, at the University of Buenos Aires. He takes over as the Executive Director of the Secretariat of the Geneva-based South Centre from 1 July 2018. Correa recently engaged in an interview with Patralekha Chatterjee for Intellectual Property Watch. [Note: this interview is number two of two. The first, with Dr Othoman Mellouk, is available here.] Continue reading ->
Dr Othoman Mellouk is a Moroccan treatment advocate who has been working on intellectual property and access to medicines for more than a decade. He is the Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines Lead at the international treatment preparedness coalition (ITPC), a global network of people living with HIV and their advocates working together to achieve access to HIV and Viral Hepatitis and a member of the WHO Strategic and Technical Advisory Committee on HIV and Hepatitis. Dr Mellouk started off in the Association for the Fight against AIDS which has been at the forefront of the response to HIV in Morocco and the introduction of the first anti-HIV generic medicines in the country. In a series supported by the Make Medicines Affordable organisation, Mellouk recently engaged in an interview with Patralekha Chatterjee for Intellectual Property Watch. Continue reading ->