Europe’s economic and Intellectual Property Crossroads
23.01.19
Today’s decision by the Legal Affairs Committee of the European Parliament (JURI) puts the future of medical innovation and access to the latest treatments for patients in Europe at risk.
While we respect the position of the co-legislators, the amendments on 2-year stockpiling, a very early implementation date and weakened safeguards, adopted today in JURI, cannot be reconciled with the objective of the duly assessed proposal of the European Commission. If adopted in the final text, the amendments will impact European patients living with unmet medical needs, they will significantly weaken Europe’s research and development offering, as well as drive away investment and jobs from our SMEs, our companies, our academic institutions and our healthcare systems.
The amendments recalibrate the European economy from a knowledge-based region at the cutting edge of research, development and medical innovation to a Europe that is not competitive on the global R&D stage and fails to attract future investments for the benefit of patients.
EFPIA Director General, Nathalie Moll said. “Building a strong, stable, and predictable research and development eco-system has taken many years and included the unicity of the region having SPCs. Jeopardising this system is particularly worrying when Europe’s attractiveness is already weakened by a number of political developments including the Brexit discussions, and other regions are strengthening their commitment to the knowledge-based economy and their IP regimes.”
She went on to say. “We are at a crossroads between a future based on science, innovation and access for patients to cutting edge treatments or a future where European patients get, at best, today’s medicines using yesterday’s research. The EU Institutions now have a very serious decision to make about what kind of future they want for Europe.”