UAEM White Paper: Serious Flaws in the Proposed Indian Bayh-Dole

As India Mulls Bill Modeled on Bayh-Dole, Critics Claim It May Stifle Innovation By Ben Butkus in the Biotech Transfer Week Mag points out to the "The Bayh-Dole Act and Promoting the Transfer of Technology of Publicly Funded-Research" a UAEM White Paper on the Proposed Indian Bayh-Dole Analogue. To read the Universities Allied For Essential Medicines white paper click here.

The Biotech Transfer Week's pierce says "UAEM echoed these concerns and introduced several more of its own in a white paper that analyzes various provisions of the Indian bill and raises questions about how the Bayh-Dole Act impacts university patenting in the US.

For instance, the UAEM suggests that both the Bayh-Dole Act and the proposed Indian IP Act focus too narrowly on patenting and licensing at the expense of other forms of "knowledge production" such as scientific publishing; and that the proposed act would "encourage research institutions to obtain patents on publicly funded research to the exclusion of other methods that could in many situations be more beneficial to access and encouraging future innovation," such as peer-reviewed publication.

UAEM also claims that the Indian IP Act contains only weak safeguards for ensuring access to life-saving medicines for developing nations such as India. "Critics of the original Bayh-Dole Act point out that the safeguards the act contained to allow for public access in case a publicly funded innovation was not made available on reasonable terms have never been successfully used," the paper states, referring to Bayh-Dole's government "march-in rights" provision."

"Instead of fixing this problem, the Indian IP Act currently has fewer safeguards aimed at preserving public access," the paper adds. "Under the Indian IP Act, the government [loses] its opportunity to preserve access to publicly funded research just 90 days after learning of the new technology."

The white paper concludes that the Indian IP Bill "has serious flaws which need to be addressed in an open and public setting to determine whether any legislation should be enacted and if so what kind."

"Given the track record of Bayh-Dole in the United States, policy makers need to seriously consider what they hope to accomplish by enacting similar legislation, its suitability for a different country context, and whether the measures adopted will accomplish the stated goals of the legislation while protecting the public interest," the paper added.

To read the entire article by Ben Butkus in the Biotech Transfer Week Mag click here.