World Health Advocacy co-hosted the "Access to Rx Drugs:  What Every Patient Should Know" workshop held in Toronto, ON on September 21 & 22, 2009.  Elisabeth Fowler helped to moderate the workshop and also delivered the attached presentation, providing an overview of the process of medical innovation.

According to a recently released report comparing international usage of prescription drugs, Canada ranks second-last (thirteenth out of 14 countries). The report – Extent and Causes of International Variations in Drug Usage – was conducted for the UK Secretary of State for Health to determine whether the UK is adequately providing for the health needs of its citizens.

The report noted that "Medicines play an important role in the management of most diseases. In recent years, there have been important changes in the drugs that are used to treat many conditions. This has helped to make many conditions more treatable, thus improving patient outcomes."

"... ensuring that are used appropriately has an important part to play in delivering high-quality, fair, safe and effective NHS services."

Overall, the UK ranks 8th (5 places better than Canada). As a result of this mid-level ranking, Britain is providing an extra 50 million pounds ($78 million) to pay for cancer medicines from October, bringing forward a government promise to give access to drugs even if they have not been approved by cost watchdog NICE.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Common Drug Review continues to provide negative recommendations to medicines often approved elsewhere – denying Canadians access to new, effective treatments.

The report also notes that "countries with well-developed health technology assessment processes appear to have similar levels of uptake across some disease areas (for example, the UK, Sweden, Australia and Canada all appear to have similar rankings in a number of areas)."

Unfortunately, similar doesn't mean better.

A majority of Canadians (73.1%) agree that the Government should strongly enforce intellectual property rights in relation to the development of new medicines. [1]

U.S. Senate and House Committees on Foreign Relations held hearings (March 10 & 11, 2010) focusing on future challenges and opportunities in global health.  This WHA report (see attached) provides an overview of discussions from these hearings and the videos capture some of the highlights.

According to a recent survey [1], a majority of Canadians (77 per cent) recognize that innovation – in the medical field as well as other sectors – is essential to the future prosperity of the country. Canadians view encouraging new discoveries and innovations as a more important factor in economic prosperity than cutting business taxes or reducing red tape.

The World Health Organization (WHO), which has been intensely debating intellectual property (IP) rights issues, has restructured its management of the issues, elevating IP to the director general’s office. A new team for public health, innovation and intellectual property has been created. (1)

This move follows the close of the second meeting of the Intergovernmental Working Group on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property (IGWG), which adjourned with no agreed strategy or plan of action amidst concerns raised by patient groups that the issue has become polarized and that the IGWG process has gone off-track.