Access to Medicines: the Role of Intellectual property Law and Policy

Intellectual property (IP) policy is an important structural determinant of health. Patent policy influences the rate and direction of innovation for health, playing a positive or negative role depending on how it is shaped and implemented. Patent policy also has critical implications for access to existing medicines and medical technologies. This has been illustrated most dramatically in the context of the global Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS)/ Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) pandemic. Prices for a three-drug combination of anti-retroviral (ARV) HIV therapy in 2000 from patent-holding companies exceeded USD $10,000 per person per year, ensuring that treatment could not be extended to the vast majority of those living with HIV around the world. Generic competition led to precipitous price reductions, so that today treatment can be provided for less than USD$75 per person per year. This history has contributed to the growing recognition that strong patent law applied to pharmaceuticals in developing countries undermines access to medicines and compromises the human right to health. While the relationship between IP and innovation is covered in a separate paper, it is worth noting here that there is little reason to expect that stronger patent rights in developing countries will lead to any substantial offsetting gains in innovation for the affected countries. Developing countries represent a very small share of the world’s pharmaceutical market, meaning that the marginal added value of stronger patent protection will be small, and is unlikely to outweigh the costs to access

Overview of liquid lubricants for advanced aircraft

An overall status report on liquid lubricants for use in high-performance turbojet engines is presented. Emphasis is placed on the oxidation and thermal stability requirements imposed upon the lubrication system. A brief history is iven of the development of turbine engine lubricants which led to synthetic oils with their inherent modification advantages. The status and state of development of some nine candidate classes of fluids for use in advanced turbine engines are discussed. Published examples of fundamental studies to obtain a better understanding of the chemistry involved in fluid degradation are reviewed. Also, alternatives to high temperature fluid development are described. The importance of of continuing work on improving high temperature lubricant candidates and encouraging development of fluid base stocks is discussed

How Robust is Comparative Advantage?

This paper reviews the theoretical development of the concept of comparative advantage, starting with the two-good model of Ricardo and the two-good extension and reinterpretation by Haberler. In both, the presence of comparative advantage provides the scope for countries to gain from trade by specializing, and the pattern of that trade is explained by the pattern of comparative advantage. These strong results of the two-good model can be extended under certain circumstances to multiple goods and countries, but under more general assumptions such strong results no longer are assured. Instead one can derive much weaker results, usually in the form of correlations between comparative advantage and trade, and these weaker results hold in a much wider variety of circumstances. The paper examines those assumptions that permit such generalizations, but then also examines when those assumptions are most likely to fail, and what happens as a result.

In vivo testing of gold nanoparticles using the Caenorhabditis elegans model organism

Gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) are present in many man-made products and cosmetics, and are also used by the food and medical industries. Tight regulations regarding the use of mammalian animals for product testing can hamper the study of the specific interactions between engineered nanoparticles and biological systems. Invertebrate models, such as the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), can offer alternative approaches during the early phases of nanoparticle discovery. Here, we thoroughly evaluated the biodistribution of 11-nm and 150-nm citrate-capped AuNPs in the model organism C. elegans at multiple scales, moving from micrometric to nanometric resolution and from the organismal to cellular level. We confirmed that the nanoparticles were not able to cross the intestinal and dermal barriers. We investigated the effect of AuNPs on the survival and reproductive performance of C. elegans, and correlated these effects with the uptake of AuNPs in terms of their number, surface area, and metal mass. In general, exposure to 11-nm AuNPs resulted in a higher toxicity than the larger 150-nm AuNPs. NP aggregation inside C. elegans was determined using absorbance microspectroscopy, which allowed the plasmonic properties of AuNPs to be correlated with their confinement inside the intestinal lumen, where anatomical traits, acidic pH and the presence of biomolecules play an essential role on NP aggregation. Finally, quantitative PCR of selected molecular markers indicated that exposure to AuNPs did not significantly affect endocytosis and intestinal barrier integrity. Statement of significance This work highlights how the simple, yet information-rich, animal model C. elegans is ideally suited for preliminary screening of nanoparticles or chemicals mitigating most of the difficulties associated with mammalian animal models, namely the ethical issues, the high cost, and time constraints. This is of particular relevance to the cosmetic, food, and pharmaceutical industries, which all have to justify the use of animals, especially during the discovery, development and initial screening phases. This work provides a detailed and thorough analysis of 11-nm and 150-nm AuNPs at multiple levels of organization (the whole organism, organs, tissues, cells and molecules).Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

One-step volumetric additive manufacturing of complex polymer structures.

Two limitations of additive manufacturing methods that arise from layer-based fabrication are slow speed and geometric constraints (which include poor surface quality). Both limitations are overcome in the work reported here, introducing a new volumetric additive fabrication paradigm that produces photopolymer structures with complex nonperiodic three-dimensional geometries on a time scale of seconds. We implement this approach using holographic patterning of light fields, demonstrate the fabrication of a variety of structures, and study the properties of the light patterns and photosensitive resins required for this fabrication approach. The results indicate that low-absorbing resins containing ~0.1% photoinitiator, illuminated at modest powers (~10 to 100 mW), may be successfully used to build full structures in ~1 to 10 s

From Status to Agency: Defining \u3ci\u3eMigrants\u3c/i\u3e

Migrants share an intricate relationship with the law. Identifying a person as a migrant implies, in ordinary language, that she has crossed legally defined territorial boundaries. In legal terminology, invoking the term migrant usually alludes to a particular legal status that entails a specific set of rights, distinguished from those of the citizen. Acknowledging the role of law in identifying and classifying people that move across national frontiers, migrants appear as legal constructs, structured by and within the law. Regulatory mechanisms designed to direct and control migration are deeply intertwined with the phenomenon they strive to govern. In itself, this circularity is not immanently flawed. Once the constitutive role of law is exposed, the self-referential nature of legal systems appears to be one of its inherent characteristics. Specific rules and standards are generated in light of particular conceptual foundations. Such conceptual underpinnings should be overtly recognized and scrutinized, given the implicit justification they provide for consequential normative outcomes

Heterogeneities in amorphous systems under shear

The last decade has seen major progresses in studies of elementary mechanisms of deformation in amorphous materials. Here, we start with a review of physically-based theories of plasticity, going back to the identification of "shear-transformations" as early as the 70's. We show how constructive criticism of the theoretical models permits to formulate questions concerning the role of structural disorder, mechanical noise, and long-ranged elastic interactions. These questions provide the necessary context to understand what has motivated recent numerical studies. We then summarize their results, show why they had to focus on athermal systems, and point out the outstanding questions.Comment: Chapter of "Dynamical Heterogeneities in glasses, colloids and granular materials", Eds.: L. Berthier, G. Biroli, J-P Bouchaud, L. Cipelletti and W. van Saarloos (Oxford University Press, to appear), more info at http://w3.lcvn.univ-montp2.fr/~lucacip/DH_book.ht

Liberalization in China's Key Service Sectors Following WTO Accession: Some Scenarios and Issues of Measurement

This paper documents and assesses the significance of the policy changes in China that WTO accession implies in 3 key service categories (banking, insurance, and telecoms), asking whether it is likely they will really be fully implemented in their entirety as undertaken at signature in 2002. While it would seem that China will have extraordinarily open markets for these services by 2007 (and for banking, perhaps in the world), the starting point for implementing these policy changes seems so highly restricted that doubts have been raised about the feasibility of implementing such changes over such a short time even if threats of eventual retaliation from WTO partners speeds things along. WTO members are monitoring the implementation of China's WTO commitments, and following dispute settlement might retaliate in the future were these agreed changes not to be implemented. I discuss what scenarios this liberalization might follow, and ask whether these commitments can really be implemented as undertaken.