Blog

The latest thoughts from Medicines Law & Policy partners.

Pharmaceutical Accountability Foundation is taking AbbVie to court over excessive pricing of Humira –...

On 21 February, the Dutch Pharmaceutical Accountability Foundation (PAF) took the bold step to take AbbVie to court, claiming the company’s pricing policy had...

TRIPS, technology transfer and access to pandemic countermeasures: What the WHO  Pandemic Treaty must...

The scrambling for access to Covid-19 vaccines by developing countries has reignited the debate on the WTO Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)...

Imagine if health and trade ministers would meet in one room this week

A earlier version of this commentary was published on 28 November 2021 by Barron's. This is a time of missed opportunities. This week, trade ministers...

Drug Price Transparency Calls Move from South Africa to World Health Assembly

by Katrina Perehudoff and Jennifer Sellin Over 30 states and 40 business and civil society groups debated strategies for affordable and sustainable medicines prices at...

Dutch Court Orders AstraZeneca to Pay Damages in Patent Evergreening Case

Today the Dutch court made a long-awaited ruling in the patent evergreening case of health insurance company Menzis versus AstraZeneca. It found that AstraZeneca...

Wrapping up 2019 – Noteworthy Medicines Law and Policy Events

2019 had its share of noteworthy medicines law and policy events. It was also a year that saw eye-popping new levels of pharmaceutical pricing....

Faced with unreasonable medicines prices, the Netherlands introduces pharmacy exemption in patent law.

On 1 February 2019, article 53(3), second sentence of the Dutch Patent Act 1995 came into force introducing a patent exemption for the preparation...

The Role of Activism in Shaping Law and Policies that Support Access to Medicines

This article is also available as a PDF here. Almost 26 years ago, here in Amsterdam, on November 25-26, 1999, Health Action International, Médecins Sans...

The People vs. AbbVie

Today, 9 May 2025, is an important day in court for the Dutch Pharmaceutical Accountability Foundation (PAF). In February 2023, PAF started a court...

2018 Round-up of Noteworthy Medicines Law and Policy Events

We are reaching the end of 2018: Time for our end-of-the-year roundup of some significant developments in medicines law and policy. January The Chilean parliament started...