Read this article in Portuguese here. 

In early February, health experts from Brazil 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 an influential and respected leader on the world stage, countries will listen to what Brazil has to say. 

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

Brazil has historically not done a good job prioritizing innovation -- and because of that the country ranks as the 66th most innovative market in the world according to WIPO’s 2019 Global Innovation Index (GII).  This puts the country down two positions from last year and behind all other BRIC nations.

The performance of the country’s biotech and pharmaceutical sectors, unfortunately, reflects the lack of attention that has been paid to innovation in Brazil over the years, despite the country’s high level of scientific expertise. For example, Brazil accounts for less than 3 percent of the world’s clinical trials and the country’s biopharmaceutical industry invests just 2.4 percent of its revenue into R&D—the worldwide investment is much higher at around 10-15 percent of revenues.