O sistema de exceções ao direito de exclusividade de patentes: análise da legislação de países selecionados e perspectivas para o Brasil

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has reignited the debate regarding the opposition between intellectual property rights, notably patents, and access to public health. Inequality in the distribution of vaccines against the disease is a fact that has been verified, in which high-income countries had access to a much greater number and in a shorter time, compared to middle- and lower-income countries. The discussion about the need to implement compulsory licenses for technologies to combat COVID-19 has gained momentum, although each country may provide the basis for adopting the exception measure to the right to patent exclusivity. In October 2020, South Africa and India presented a proposal to the World Trade Organization to suspend the application of certain provisions of the TRIPS Agreement, especially on patents and the protection of confidential information, which was only decided in June 2022, in a very different way from that proposed. This work will analyze the bases of exceptions to patent rights within the scope of the TRIPS Agreement and selected countries to, in the end, comparatively analyze whether Brazil has room to improve its compulsory patent licensing system at the internal and even regional level.