TY - JOUR
T1 - The Health Impact Fund
T2 - Enhancing Justice and Efficiency in Global Health
AU - Pogge, Thomas
PY - 2012/11
Y1 - 2012/11
N2 - Some 18 million people die annually from poverty-related causes. Many more are suffering grievously from treatable medical conditions. These burdens can be substantially reduced by supplementing the rules governing pharmaceutical innovation. Established by the World Trade Organization's TRIPS Agreement, these rules cause advanced medicines to be priced beyond the reach of the poor and steer medical research away from diseases concentrated among them. We should complement these rules with the Health Impact Fund (HIF). Financed by many governments, the HIF would offer any new pharmaceutical product the opportunity to participate, during its first 10 years, in the HIF's annual reward pools, receiving a share equal to its share of the assessed health impact of all HIF-registered products. In exchange, the innovator would have to agree to make this product available worldwide at the lowest feasible cost of manufacture. Fully consistent with TRIPS, the HIF achieves three key advances. It directs some pharmaceutical innovation toward the most serious diseases, including those concentrated among the poor. It makes all HIF-registered medicines cheaply available to all. And it incentivizes innovators to promote the optimal use of their HIF-registered medicines. Magnifying one another's effects, these advances would engender large global health gains.
AB - Some 18 million people die annually from poverty-related causes. Many more are suffering grievously from treatable medical conditions. These burdens can be substantially reduced by supplementing the rules governing pharmaceutical innovation. Established by the World Trade Organization's TRIPS Agreement, these rules cause advanced medicines to be priced beyond the reach of the poor and steer medical research away from diseases concentrated among them. We should complement these rules with the Health Impact Fund (HIF). Financed by many governments, the HIF would offer any new pharmaceutical product the opportunity to participate, during its first 10 years, in the HIF's annual reward pools, receiving a share equal to its share of the assessed health impact of all HIF-registered products. In exchange, the innovator would have to agree to make this product available worldwide at the lowest feasible cost of manufacture. Fully consistent with TRIPS, the HIF achieves three key advances. It directs some pharmaceutical innovation toward the most serious diseases, including those concentrated among the poor. It makes all HIF-registered medicines cheaply available to all. And it incentivizes innovators to promote the optimal use of their HIF-registered medicines. Magnifying one another's effects, these advances would engender large global health gains.
KW - Access
KW - Cost-effectiveness
KW - Global health disparities
KW - Innovation
KW - Justice
KW - Medicines
KW - Patents
KW - Pay-for-performance
KW - Research and development
KW - TRIPS Agreement
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84869424300&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/19452829.2012.703172
DO - 10.1080/19452829.2012.703172
M3 - Article
SN - 1945-2829
VL - 13
SP - 537
EP - 559
JO - Journal of Human Development and Capabilities
JF - Journal of Human Development and Capabilities
IS - 4
ER -