Health Update: IFC Healthcare Fund, Clinton HIV drugs, Gates Foundation Strategy

Oodles of news on global public health.
1. The FT carries an article on IFC’s plans to create an Africa healthcare fund of about $500 million. According to the report, the agency has been funding work, in collaboration with the Gates Foundation, to develop an equity, debt and technical assistance fund to finance commercial healthcare projects. [...]

Brazil breaks patent on Merck’s AIDS drug

On Friday May 4, Brazil decided to break off negotiations with Merck on the pricing of its AIDS drug Efavirenz, instead issuing a compulsory license to import the drug from India (reported on BBC, Reuters, WSJ Health Blog). Brazil was presently paying $1.6 per pill, and had offered a reduced price of $1.10. Brazil, however, [...]

Random Nuggets: Patents, Generics, and Climate Change

The IHT reported two interesting pharma related news items.

It may be high season for patent reform in the US. According to the IHT, Democratic control of Congress, pressure to control healthcare costs, and lobbying by the high-tech industry for weaker patent legislation and protection from frivolous patent infringement suits might finally overturn the stranglehold of [...]

Stiglitz on Patents and Health R&D

The topic of Advanced Market Commitments has been in the news recently, with several weighty proponents pushing it as a way to close the global drug research gap, particularly for vaccines. Now, Joseph Stiglitz has a very interesting article on patents, “prize funds”, and the problems of both. Reading it is particularly rewarding because it [...]

Advance Market Commitment for Vaccines takes off: A Partial Solution

Crossposted from the THDBlog.
CGDev reported on Monday (also covered in BW) that some G7 nations, together with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have agreed to provide an advance market commitment of $1.5 billion for purchase of vaccines against pneumococcal disease. Why is this commitment important?
By promising in advance to pay for life-saving vaccines once they are [...]

New Drug Developments point to New Industry Model

Three interesting pieces of news in the pharmaceutical industry, reported yesterday on IHT and the Wall Street Journal Europe, point to an emerging trend in drug development and R&D.

The Relation between Health and GNP: India and China

Greg Mankiw points to a Google tool (from Gapminder) plotting per capita GNP and life expectancy of several countries over time. I presume it is supposed to show the strong correlation between economic growth and improvements in health, but I noticed some problems with.
Insufficient Correlation between Health and GNP
As a patriotic Indian I first compared [...]

News Nuggets: Manufacturing Cheap Vaccines, Ayurveda, and Bioprospecting Breakthroughs

Three interesting health-related news, all from alternative media.
Vaccine Manufacture Breakthrough
The Voice of America is reporting (also reported on THDBlog and in India) that Henry Daniell of the University of Central Florida has achieved a breakthrough to manufacture existing vaccines by genetically engineering plants. The new process skips existing processes, cutting costs substantially and allows vaccines [...]