So the patent system has been a great driver
of medical inventions.
We've seen some terrific discoveries and inventions
in the medical space.
But as we've evolved in the system, I think
we're starting to see-- as a lawyer who's
practiced in this area, we're starting to
see a lot of strategies that are played by
pharmaceutical companies in order to maintain
their monopolistic hold or their exclusivity
hold over a particular product.
And what they do is they ratchet up a number
of patents around a particular product in
order to prevent competition from getting
in.
And we all know that once you have competition,
prices drive down.
There's a number of studies that show prices
can drop more than 50% if you get competition
in the marketplace sooner.
So the idea that companies want to do is to
basically prevent that competition from coming
in earlier.
And then the other argument of that is: are
they then really inventing new things?
Because what they do is they hold on to the
marketplace as long as they can on the existing
product.
They extend the franchise out by using patents,
sometimes with the potential of holding the
market for 40 years unless litigated.
And we all know that litigation doesn't solve
all the problems.
And we've seen that in a number of the top-selling
drugs in the United States.
We've done studies as an organization where
we have seen price hikes between 2012 and
2016 on the top 12 selling drugs in the United
States have 68%.
And we've seen in parallel to that the number
of patents that have been stacked up on those
products, even after the product has been
approved, even after the initial patent has
expired, which is a 20 year term.
And so they're just pushing it out further
and further and further so that they can delay
the competition getting in.
And that all leads to market power and it
all leads to the ability to increase prices
at will.
If you look at a pharmaceutical company, the
scientists who work there, the people who
work on the development of drugs, their primary
purpose is to help people, I believe.
I genuinely believe that.
I believe the conversations I've had with
people from that sector.
They believe that if they bring a new product
to market and it saves someone's life or it
can actually make somebody healthy, they really
do believe that.
Unfortunately, there's a business side to
it, as well.
And so what you have is for every scientist,
you have probably two lawyers who are watching
over them saying, “OK, how can we extract
a patent out of this and to make sure that
nobody else gets in there?”
And so what we have is then you have-- in
particularly the pharmaceutical market, there's
an argument that it's become overly financialized
in terms of its investors who drive what companies
do, rather than maybe the initially intended
purpose was to deliver health products and
to help make people not have to become ill
and stay alive.
And I think some of that has got lost in the
process as pharmaceutical companies now really
start to look at their bottom line and their
shareholders and what the investors want rather
than what their original purpose was (to help
people become healthier).
And I think that the bargain of that has tilted
more towards the financial-ization of things
rather than thinking about health first.
I-MAK comprises lawyers and scientists who
have come from the private practice background.
We've all worked in industry.
I myself have been a solicitor in the United
Kingdom, working for the commercial side of
intellectual property for over 10 years.
And we've taken that knowledge to apply it
in a public interest way, whereby we look
at, particularly in the pharmaceutical industry,
how do pharmaceutical corporations strategize
their patent filings in order to get the maximum
protection?
So what we do is, we look at a product, it
could even be still in development, and we'll
do what we call the due diligence and the
analysis of all their patent filings.
So for example, if it's a product that revolves
around a small chemical compound, we'll identify
what that chemical structure is, and then
what we'll do is we'll do patent searches.
There are various databases that you can use.
We put in keywords, we will use compound searches,
and then we'll find out what it is that the
company has filed for.
And then we track how many other patents that
the company is adding on in the lifetime of
the product.
And that way, we build up a sense of what
is their entire portfolio around that particular
product.
And that then gives us a sense of what their
strategy is, what potentially is the new version
of the product that they may be lining up.
So what they do is typically, products these
days in the pharmaceutical market, they're
on the market for five years and then they'll
switch it out to the next version of the product.
And these patents usually tell you what's
coming down the line.
And we use that essentially then to make decisions.
And often at the behest of organizations,
such as Doctors Without Borders, who want
to get access to these products, but they
say “the patents are a barrier, the prices
are too high.”
And then we'll investigate the science behind
them as we're doing these analysis.
And what we realize is many times, the science
behind it is not new.
And then at that point, we decide whether
we want to challenge those patents in order
to remove the barriers so that competition
can get in earlier.
And by doing that, then we get generic competition
in earlier if we're successful, and prices
drop significantly.
And we've achieved in various ways.
For example, in India, we've been very successful
with the HIV drug Kaletra, which is a product
owned by Abbott Laboratories and now Abbvie.
And we were able to challenge the key patents
on their drug such that Abbott eventually
withdrew all its patent applications, and
Indian generic companies could continue to
supply this particular product at a much lower
price not only to Indian patients, but also
many patients around the world, and particularly
in Africa.
And so we were to keep that market at a much
accessible way for people living with HIV/AIDS.
And that, for us, has been one of the greatest
successes.
But more recently we've done it for the new
Hepatitis C drugs.
For example, just this year, we got a decision
in the drug by Gilead called sofosbuvir.
We were able to win a case in China.
And China has 10 million people living with
hepatitis C. And the fact that we won these
two cases in China now has the potential for
other actors to come in and supply the Chinese
market, which could save conservatively, if
you were just to treat 15% of the people living
with hepatitis C in China, that would save
$13 billion.
So overall, our impact of our work has the
potential of saving $1 billion to the various
countries that then need to be able to get
access to these drugs.
