When developing countries band together, lifesaving drugs become cheaper and easier to buy − with trade-offs

Pharmaceutical companies have little incentive to sell drugs to countries that can’t afford them. But bargaining together can increase access to vital treatments worldwide.

Nahim Bin Zahur, Assistant Professor of Economics, Queen's University, Ontario • conversation
June 17, 2025 • ~10 min

When humans use AI to earn patents, who is doing the inventing?

US patent law says inventors must be human, but they can use AI. This changes the nature of invention and raises the question: Is this what the founders had in mind when they set up the patent system?

W. Keith Robinson, Professor of Law, Wake Forest University • conversation
March 14, 2025 • ~8 min

From rhino horn snuff to pangolin livestock feed: we analysed half a century of patents to track the wildlife trade’s evolution

Analysis of thousands of patent applications sheds new light on hidden wild harvests.

Susanne Masters, PhD Candidate, Institute of Biology, Leiden University • conversation
Aug. 27, 2024 • ~8 min

Don’t let ‘FDA-approved’ or ‘patented’ in ads give you a false sense of security

Most people don’t know what these labels really mean − and advertisers take advantage of that fact.

Michael Mattioli, Professor of Law and Louis F. Niezer Faculty Fellow, Indiana University • conversation
Feb. 14, 2024 • ~4 min

When authoritative sources hold onto bad data: A legal scholar explains the need for government databases to retract information

Theranos was dissolved years ago, and its CEO, Elizabeth Holmes, is in prison, but the company’s patents based on bad science live on – a stark example of the persistence of faulty information.

Janet Freilich, Associate Professor of Law, Fordham University • conversation
Dec. 14, 2023 • ~8 min

Blame capitalism? Why hundreds of decades-old yet vital drugs are nearly impossible to find

The shortages, which have been going on for years, have typically affected only low-cost generics rather than profitable brand-name drugs.

Geoffrey Joyce, Director of Health Policy, USC Schaeffer Center, and Associate Professor, University of Southern California • conversation
July 20, 2023 • ~9 min

In rural America, right-to-repair laws are the leading edge of a pushback against growing corporate power

Corporations restrict what farmers can do with their own seeds, as well as their farm equipment when it breaks down.

Leland Glenna, Professor of Rural Sociology and Science, Technology, and Society, Penn State • conversation
Feb. 22, 2023 • ~10 min

Pharma's expensive gaming of the drug patent system is successfully countered by the Medicines Patent Pool, which increases global access and rewards innovation

The Medicines Patent Pool was created to promote public health, facilitating generic licensing for patented drugs that treat diseases predominantly affecting low- and middle-income countries.

Lucy Xiaolu Wang, Assistant Professor of Resource Economics, UMass Amherst • conversation
Dec. 5, 2022 • ~11 min

Repurposing generic drugs can reduce time and cost to develop new treatments – but low profitability remains a barrier

Drug repurposing can redeem failed treatments and squeeze out new uses from others. But many pharmaceutical companies are hesitant to retool existing drugs without a high return on investment.

Jonathan Sexton, Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine and Medicinal Chemistry, University of Michigan • conversation
April 6, 2022 • ~11 min

CORBEVAX, a new patent-free COVID-19 vaccine, could be a pandemic game changer globally

CORBEVAX is anticipated to significantly expand vaccine access to people in low- and middle-income countries.

Maureen Ferran, Associate Professor of Biology, Rochester Institute of Technology • conversation
Jan. 19, 2022 • ~9 min

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