Justifying pro-poor innovation in the life sciences: a brief overview of the ethical landscape

C. Timmermann

Justifying pro-poor innovation in the life sciences: a brief overview of the ethical landscape

In: The ethics of consumption

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C. Timmermann

C. Timmermann Wageningen University, Department of Social Sciences, Applied Philosophy Group, Hollandseweg 1, 6706 KN Wageningen, the Netherlands; Centre for Society and the Life Sciences, P.O. Box 9010, 6500 GL Nijmegen, the Netherlands; cristian.timmermann@wur.nl

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Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 339–346

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.3920/9789086867844_056

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An idea is a public good. The use of an idea by one person does not hinder others to benefit from the same idea. However in order to generate new life-saving ideas, e.g. inventions in the life sciences, a huge amount of human and material resources are needed. Powerful, but highly criticized tools to speed up the rate of innovation are exclusive rights, most prominently the use of patents and plant breeders’ rights. Exclusive rights leave by nature a number of people empty-handed, with starvation, stuntedness, prevalence of disease and death as preventable and quotidian consequences. To stimulate a human rights compatible use of exclusive rights a wide range of moral frameworks have been developed to condemn current praxes. Most prominent in the debate are theories building on: (1) utilitarian calculations of weighing benefits with Peter Singer as a prominent advocate; (2) Pogge’s vindication of compensatory duties for institutional harms; (3) a comprehensive analysis on how the current innovation incentive system fails to secure human rights and human capabilities; and lastly (4) showing how the status quo nurtures misrecognition. With help of those theories modest targets as well as a thorough restructure of the innovation incentive system can be justified. Those theories have the mammoth task of restraining well-established ideas supporting the permissibility of a reckless use of property rights that are deeply anchored in the property law discourse. Life sciences raise a range of special problems when justifying pro-poor innovation. Healthy people living in a society with a good sanitary infrastructure need far less resources to tackle health problems than people in places with a poor infrastructure. Patents that involve gene sequences (or part thereof ) make inventing around impossible, making the seeking of licenses mandatory for investigators wanting to make follow-up research with the molecule. Speedy sharing of data concerning public health hazards or threats to food security are vital to maintain living standards.

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The ethics of consumption

The citizen, the market, and the law

E-Book ISBN:: 9789086867844

Publisher:: Wageningen Academic

Print Publication Date:: 01 Nov 2013

Subjects
- Life Sciences

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Justifying pro-poor innovation in the life sciences: a brief overview of the ethical landscape

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The ethics of consumption

The citizen, the market, and the law

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