Medicines patent pool

The Medicines Patent Pool aims to improve access to affordable and appropriate HIV medicines in developing countries through voluntary licensing of critical intellectual property.

Why a Medicines Patent Pool?

The Medicines Patent Pool was created in response to the threat that crucial sources of affordable HIV medicines were drying up. This is due to increased global pharmaceutical patenting required by countries’ membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO). When a medicine is patented in a specific country, it prevents anyone but the patent holder from producing and selling it, usually for a patent term of 20 years. This creates a monopoly situation, where it is possible to charge the highest price for medicines that a market can bear because there are no competitors. And people who can not afford such prices – particularly those who live in developing countries – are left empty-handed. A World Health Organization action plan that looks, among other things, at the relationship between patents and access to medicines, indicated that patent pools would be one way to address the lack of access to affordable and adapted medicines in developing countries.