Patents are important as an incentive for the private producers of knowledge. But nothing bars governments, individually or collectively, to develop complementary mechanisms aimed at making knowledge more public by design. In the Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, for example, we are, among other things, discussing the proposal for a global vaccine-purchasing fund. Further it could be an effective and efficient incentive for private producers of medical knowledge, such as pharmaceutical companies, to focus more on treatments for more poor-specific diseases. But, of course, such an international incentive policy measure as the vaccine-purchasing fund would only be one of the ingredients of addressing present global health challenges.
International cooperation is key.
In sum, looking at health through the GPG lens tells us that contagious diseases are in today's globalising world likely to constitute a global public bad, a mutual, shared problem of all. It tells us that the know-how to address the issue needs to be shared. Knowledge is non-rival and making it public by design is more efficient than keeping access to medical knowledge restricted. I would like to submit for your consideration four concrete suggestions. First, increase our financial commitments.