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In early February, health experts from Austria and 33 other countries will convene at the 146th session of the World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Board. These delegates form the key decision-making body that guides the WHO on global health, touching on diverse topics ranging from vaccines and food safety to maternal, newborn and child nutrition. As a leader on global health and development, Austria has great influence on the Executive Board. Other countries listen carefully to its views.
This year the Executive Board will revisit the WHO’s Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property (GSPOA). Negotiated for many years and approved by consensus in 2008, the GSPOA is a framework to help countries set policies to drive discovery of new treatments and cures for diseases that disproportionately affect developing countries. Critically, the GSPOA recognized the importance of intellectual property (IP) protections as “an important incentive in the development of health care products.”
Unfortunately, there have been efforts to refocus the GSPOA on issues that would harm innovation, both for developed and developing countries. Rather than strengthen the IP protections that support health care innovation, some groups have urged governments to weaken them, for example, by breaking patents on new inventions – a drastic action known as compulsory licensing. But studies continue to refute the flawed notion that intellectual property protections prevent patients from accessing new technologies and point to many others barriers that stand in the way
Austria has strong track record of defending and valuing intellectual property rights that have helped support its rapidly growing innovative industries – particularly in the biopharmaceutical sector. According to a recent study, 917 companies in the fields of biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and medical engineering generate 5.8 percent of the country’s gross domestic product and employ a workforce of approximately 55,000 people – a 7.4 percent increase of the workforce since 2014. Austria also consistently ranks in the top 25 countries on the annual Global Innovation Index by the World Intellectual Property Organization – indicating the country is sustaining and advancing a pro-innovation environment.
The February 2020 WHO Executive Board meeting is an excellent opportunity for Austria to underscore the value of intellectual property on the global stage – and help to find real solutions to pressing global health challenges.
Despite the potential for improvement in government research and development investment, statements in recent international meetings echo their support of innovation:
- At the World Intellectual Property Organization’s Assemblies last fall, Austria underscored the role of intellectual property “to stimulate creativity and innovation and thus contributing to economic, cultural and social development of all countries.”
- In another statement at the World Intellectual Property Organization’s Assemblies last fall, Austria encouraged the organization to promote intellectual property across the world. Austria urged other countries to “continue and even expand efforts and activities to further strengthen the overall IP-environment… which continues to offer timely and high-quality services to the users building upon a balanced and effective international IP system encompassing all categories of intellectual property rights and for the benefit of all stakeholders.”
The February 2020 WHO Executive Board meeting is an excellent opportunity for Austria to underscore the value of intellectual property on the global stage – and help to find real solutions to pressing global health challenges.
For example, Austria can help prompt a serious conversation about better using incentives, including intellectual property, to spur more research and development into diseases affecting the developing world. Austria can also stress the need for countries, at all levels of development, to have strong health care systems that enable universal access to safe and affordable medicines.
