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Trans-Pacific Partnership May Endanger World Health, Newly Leaked Chapter Shows

Posted by samzenpus on from the keeper-of-the-pills dept.

blottsie writes WikiLeaks has released an updated version of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) chapter on intellectual property. The new version of the texts, dated May 2014, show that little improvement has been made to sections critics say would hurt free speech online. Further, some of the TPP's stipulations could have dire consequences for healthcare in developing nations. The Daily Dot reports: "Nearly all of the changes proposed by the U.S. advantage corporate entities by expanding monopolies on knowledge goods, such as drug patents, and impose restrictive copyright policies worldwide. If it came into force, TPP would even allow pharmaceutical companies to sue the U.S. whenever changes to regulatory standards or judicial decisions affected their profits. Professor Brook K. Baker of Northeastern U. School of Law [said] that the latest version of the TPP will do nothing less than lengthen, broaden, and strengthen patent monopolies on vital medications."

12 of 132 comments (clear)

  1. freedoms f----d by harvey+the+nerd · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "Whenever changes to regulatory standards... affected their profits?"
    So if a country deregulates absurd and life threatening over-regulations, Merck, Pfizer, GSK etc sue the country/taxpayers ?
    Maybe Putin will do us a favor and launch the nukes.

    1. Re:freedoms f----d by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      State-guaranteed monopolies don't encourage innovation, they encourage rent-seeking.

    2. Re:freedoms f----d by Immerman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And do you really believe a pharmaceutical company would invest years of lab time and millions of dollars developing a cure for X if the guys down the street would be allowed to immediately copy it and sell it at production cost + 1%? There's no way they would ever be able to recoup the development costs, so they wouldn't bother. Drug research funding would be restricted only to academia, government, and philanthropists. Granted, there's much to be said for such a system, there's some serious perverse incentives in the current arrangement - but there's also nothing stopping those other research avenues now, and yet they remain woefully neglected in comparison.

      Now I'm definitely not saying our patent system doesn't have serious issues, but there's something to be said for giving inventors a chance to recoup their initial investment. Myself, I like the idea of simply going back to requiring the president to individually sign every approved patent - we'd almost instantly drop the rate of patent approvals to only a few per day, and the thousands of others that didn't make the cut would just have to be discarded. Are there really thousands of inventions per day that enrich humanity enough to justify granting a 20-year monopoly to recoup the development costs? I doubt it. I'd be surprised if there were five.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    3. Re:freedoms f----d by SuricouRaven · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Patents in pharmacuticals work well.

      Their application to software has been a disaster. They are granted so readily and for things so obvious, it's now become a common practice for companies to collect as huge a portfolio of crap-patents as possible just so they can win a legal battle by attrition, then cross-license with sufficiently powerful rivals so they can avoid suing each other into oblivion. It's reached the point where it's impossible to write anything more complicated than Hello, World without potentially infringing a patent somewhere.

      Patent reform is needed. Raising costs wouldn't work, as it just disadvantages small companies and individuals. Tougher approval processes would go a long way though, and courts should have more power to penalize patent holders if the patent is later found in court to be obvious, trivial or based on prior art which the patent holder should have been aware of.

    4. Re:freedoms f----d by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 3, Insightful

      and European intellectuals invented all sort of rationalizations for why their supposedly superior culture kept failing while the US was thriving.

      Now I'm waiting for American intellectuals to invent all sort of rationalizations for why their supposedly superior culture keeps failing while some developing countries are thriving. ;-)

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    5. Re:freedoms f----d by TheDarkMaster · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Corporate profit is more important than our lives, is the current mantra of the USA. And then americans do not understand why most of the world hates them.

      --
      Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
    6. Re:freedoms f----d by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And do you really believe a pharmaceutical company would invest years of lab time and millions of dollars developing a cure for X if the guys down the street would be allowed to immediately copy it and sell it at production cost + 1%?

      Let me tell you how it actually works. The really pioneering research is done by universities and government funded labs. They do the really risky, in terms of ROI, work that leads to new medicines and treatments. Once they have something that could be turned into a valuable product they either sell the IP or set up a small company that the big pharma guys can buy. The big companies then make a product, get it approved and sell it for a nice profit. I'm not saying that is an easy or cheap process, but they are not the ones responsible for most of the major advancements. The research they do is mostly aimed at increasing their profits, not improving health.

      It would be better if governments just banded together, like say through the EU, and funded the whole process from initial R&D to release themselves, and made it all available for as little cost as possible. Unfortunately there are not enough socialists to make it happen, but that would be the best option for public health and keeping costs down.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  2. Secret proceedings, I'm not surprised by s.petry · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The fact that all of these meetings are being held in secrecy and away from public discourse is very telling. Like NAFTA, this is being touted as something great for free trade, but in fact is intended to benefit an oligarchical subset of society. Worse, that same subset has no consideration for the remainder of the citizens of the USA.

    Simple, write your Reps and get them to denounce this garbage legislation. Vote them out of office if they don't denounce this bill and distance themselves. If you have 2 candidates that both want the bill, petition your own candidate on the ballot and lose the cronies.

    Be warned too, that just like SOPA this is going to continually be pushed behind the scenes under new names and false pretenses.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  3. Cui bono? by nickmalthus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Who are the parties driving this agreement? The corporate lobbyist in China and the US who are secretly drafting this agreement for their own benefit.

    As Thomas Jefferson once stated, "Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains."

    Listen to US billionaire Steve Wynn in his own words call the communist China, where most of his revenue comes from, "the most laissez-faire place on the planet at the moment". When I grew up communism was the evil empire but it appears if they start taking American Express those transgressions are quickly overlooked.

    China has illuminated what the most successful government model is for economic growth as they have surpassed the US in global trade and will soon become the largest economy in the world. This secret treaty is an effort to codify the globalist's privileged trading status and would accelerate the vast income inequality that plagues both China and the US. Every American should remember that the revolutionary Boston Tea Party was a reaction to a tax imposed for the direct benefit of the East India corporation's monopoly. Any elected official that privately or publicly supports this travesty should be held accountable at the voting booth.

    --
    If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be-T J
  4. Re:The one area where patents have reasonable term by s.petry · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not really a conundrum, the problem is easily solved by making medical research not-for-profit.

    Enforced monopolies are bad for society.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  5. Re:The one area where patents have reasonable term by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Where should these tests be held? I hope the good people of Guinea get lucky, then at least in name it would be fitting.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  6. Re:The one area where patents have reasonable term by SuricouRaven · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It needs both approaches together. Sometimes research needs the sort of massive funding only commercial interests can provide. Other times there wouldn't be any profit it in (Disease too rare, treatment too cheap) and you need non-profit work from academia, charity or government. Neither is right in all circumstances.