Want to learn more?
Listed here are some basic and advanced readings on the subject of university technology transfer, patenting, licensing and access to medicines:
The Kept University, by Eyal Press and Jennifer Washburn (March 2000) from The Atlantic Monthly: "Commercially sponsored research is putting at risk the paramount value of higher education -- disinterested inquiry. Even more alarming, the authors argue, universities themselves are behaving more and more like for-profit companies."
Keeping science open: the effects of intellectual property policy on the conduct of science, a major report from the Royal Society.
Property Rights Theory and the Commons (1996) by UC Berkeley-Boalt Law School Professor Robert Merges, arguing that privatization via patenting threatens the collaborative model of scientific research.
Look at Brazil, Tina Rosenberg's ground-breaking expose on the success of Brazil's AIDS medicine distribution strategy, from The New York Times Magazine.
ACT-UP and Fuzeon - The latest information about the newly-controversial AIDS drug, developed through research at Duke University but sold to Roche.
Of Patients and Profits - A three part investigative series in The Baltimore Sun on university-industry relationships (June 2001)
- Part I: How a Cancer Trial Ended in Betrayal
- Part II: The Changing Creed of Hopkins Science
- Part III: Standing Up to Industry
Can Patents Deter Innovation? The Anticommons in Biomedical Research by Michael A. Heller, Rebecca S. Eisenberg, Science, (May 1, 1998), making the case for the "tragedy of the anticommons," which suggests that intellectual property rights may lead paradoxically to fewer useful products for improving human health.
The Growth of Patenting and Licensing by U.S. Universities: An Assessment of the Impact of the Bayh-Dole Act (pdf file), by David C. Mowery, Richard R. Nelson, Bhaven N. Sampat, and Arvids A. Ziedonis.
Florida University's website on the impact of University patenting and licensing on local jobs and industry (with links to reports about the supposed synergy between university patenting and local economies)
Colleges Reaped $576-Million in Licensing Royalties in 1998, Survey Finds (Dec. 10, 1999), from the Chronicle of Higher Education.
Risky Business Universities and Intellectual Property, By Julia Porter Liebeskind, from Academe magazine: "Academic institutions and individual professors can profit from patenting faculty research, but they may be endangering the future of science."
Will increasingly aggressive licensing terms on research tool patents hurt basic research? (March 16, 2001) from Signals magazine.
The Access to Essential Medicines Campaign run by Doctors Without Borders.