I plan to write up a more detailed analysis of the WIPO open ended consultation on the treaty for persons who are blind or have other disabilities. I did want to make a few quick notes, however.
I was recently asked the following question:
Jamie
What is your view on the treatment of prize funds? By all standards it is treated as a radical off the wall proposal when in fact it is market based. Why is there so much resistance?
My response was as follows:
Below are asks from the 2010 PhRMA submission to the USTR Special 301 list on the topic of drug pricing and reimbursement decisions, and described as ‘Market Access Barriers.’ In its assertions, PhRMA attack countries for government price negotiations, making use of reference pricing, the insufficient involvement of pharmaceutical companies in setting government pricing policies and the composition of drug formularies, among other things.
CHINA
KEI is one of several public health groups working with Sean Flynn on filing comments in the current U.S.T.R. request for comments on the Special 301 process (Federal Register Notice USTR-2010-0003-0129). In addition, KEI filed these comments:
KEI comments on Special 301
18 February 2010
KEI provides the following comments regarding the 2010 Special 301 Review, including but not limited to the Identification of Countries Under Section 182 of the Trade Act of 1974.
Our comments include the following points:
The World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Board will soon consider the Executive Summary of the Report of the Expert Working Group on Research and Development Financing, a document, formally identified as EB 126/6 Add.1.
In the section of the report on “Funding allocation proposals,” the EWG considers two types of innovation inducement prizes, including
31 (c) milestone prizes; and
31 (d) end-prizes (cash)
The Library Copyright Alliance (LCA) consists of the American Library Association, the Association of College and Research Libraries and the Association of Research Libraries.
Collectively, the ALA, ACRL and ARL represent over 139,000 libraries in the United States employing approximately 350,000 librarians and other personnel.
India delivered the following intervention at MSF’s workshop at the World Trade Organization Public Forum today. The title of the MSF workshop was “Controversy at customs – the detention of medicines in transit: what impact on access to medicines?”
Controversy at customs – the detention of medicines in transit: what impact on access to medicines?
Wednesday 30 September 2009, 14:15 to 16:15
WTO building, Room A
The following is the written statement for the record that KEI has provided to the WIPO General Assembly, on the topic of the work program for the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR).
Knowledge Ecology International (KEI) recommends that the topic of the broadcast treaty be removed from the SCCR agenda, for the following reasons.
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) was a product of the WSIS-Tunis Agenda and was given a fairly open-ended and ambiguous mandate. Continue Reading
Date: September 10, 2009
On September 10, 2009 KEI hosted a brownbag lunch to discuss the scope of patentable subject matter, focusing specifically on the implications for life-science patents of the Supreme Court’s forthcoming review of the Bilski Federal Circuit opinion. This is the first time since 1981 that the US Supreme Court will address the limits of patentable subject matter.
The key U.S. statue on this issue is Section 101 of the patent law:
35 USC 101. Inventions patentable