The Impact of Patent Protection on Health Care in India and the UK. A Comparative Analysis

Doctoral Thesis / Dissertation from the year 2017 in the subject Law - European and International Law, Intellectual Properties, grade: 1, Coventry University, language: English, abstract: This research undertakes a review of available studies to conduct a critical analysis of the impact of patent protection in developing health care innovations and further on public health in India and the UK. A patent is an intellectual property right that is granted to an inventor of a product, to exclude others from manufacturing, selling, importing an invention without the permission of the inventor. It is a social contract whereby the patentee is granted a monopoly over their invention, and in return society receives innovation. Therefore, it is an incentive scheme to benefit inventors and society as a whole. There are several laws which regulate Patents, such as patent protection, increasing the life of a patent, reducing patentability standards and extending patent protection to undesirable products increase monopolies. The patent owners gain exclusive rights in the form of patents or an exclusive license, thus leading to an increase in the cost of such products. In addition, the patent owners adopt strategies to extend the scope of patent gain additional patents which protect the underlying ingredient of the medicine. Many pharmaceutical products are protected by Patents. The generic drug manufacturers in the pharmaceutical industry are affected such laws, which in turn affects the price of medicines available to patients. This creates a problem of access to affordable means of healthcare and further affects public health. Finally, the research will provide recommendations such as a framework of price control model to ensure sufficient access to medicines, and other recommendation for future of the progressing patent system of both the countries.