Blog

The latest thoughts from Medicines Law & Policy partners.

WHO Members meet to finalise the Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing Instrument

In May 2025, the WHO member states adopted the Pandemic Agreement, but they left the work to establish an instrument for Pathogen Access and...
Generic lumacaftor/ivacaftor

Cystic Fibrosis Buyers Club Shows the UK Government The Way

The move by a group of parents of children with cystic fibrosis (CF) to set up a buyers club to gain access to treatments...

Time to put a stop to the abuse of orphan drug regulation- the latest...

Today, the Dutch Medical Journal (Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde) reported on the case of lutetium-octreotaat, a cancer drug developed by researchers in the Dutch...

The Most Common Misunderstanding about Compulsory Licensing

The belief that a country can only use compulsory licensing in cases of public health emergencies is a myth that has proven difficult to...

Medicines Law & Policy responds to US Health and Human Services Department request for...

On 12 December 2023 the US Health and Human Services Department (HHS) posted a notice and request for comments on “the implications of access...

Dutch Minister of Health writes open letter to pharma, threatens to name and shame

"Dear Pharma," writes the Dutch Minister of Health, Bruno Bruins in an open letter in the daily newspaper the Volkskrant, "Last week two messages jumped...

The EU proposed Covid waivers of certain TRIPS rules are mostly meaningless

Since October 2020, discussions have been ongoing at the World Trade Organization’s Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Council about a waiver of...

Cystic Fibrosis Medicines Wars in Europe

Monday 4 February, the UK parliament will debate the issuing of a compulsory licence by the government, called ‘Crown use’, for the cystic fibrosis...

Socially Responsible Licensing of Medical Technologies

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND: On 31 October, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) held their...

Strong call for transparency on medicine prices, cost of R&D at WHO Fair Pricing...

“Medical innovation has little social value if most people cannot access its benefits…. this is a global human rights issue,” said Mariângela Simão, Assistant...