Intellectual Property vs Human Health: Who Will Smoke Whom? Is the New European Tobacco Product Directive Trips Compliant?

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Dauphine van de Werve de Schilde
2021 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 130-143
Author(s):  
MA Mondol ◽  
AMM Hosain ◽  
S Sultana ◽  
S Marzia ◽  
MA Islam ◽  
...  

Worldwide, tobacco is one of the leading causes of disability and death. Over a million of pounds of toxic chemicals are released by tobacco products. This study aims to explore the effects of tobacco toxicants on human health and environmental pollution. Four districts (Dhaka, Kushtia, Chattogram and Rangpur) were selected where most of the tobacco product grown. Total 468 respondents were interviewed face-to-face using structured questionnaire to assess the knowledge about toxicant content in tobacco and health and environmental hazards of tobacco use. Survey results revealed that about 44.4% respondents used smoking tobacco products and 38.5% used smokeless tobacco, while only 17.1% used both. About two third (74.3%) of smoking tobacco users started smoking when they were between 15 to 24 years old and majority (61.6%) of smokeless tobacco users started tobacco when they were between 30 to 35 years above. Tobacco product has large impacts on health of young smokers. Smokers are suffering from various acute and chronic diseases. Among the respondents, 38% indicated that they were suffering from hypertension. The second most affected disease was COPD/Asthma (31.6%), while cancer was the least suffering disease (0.4%). Majority of the respondents were not aware about the presence of toxicants (i.e. nicotine, tar and metals) in tobacco products. However, 85.1% tobacco users had an idea about environmental pollution. There is a lack of knowledge among the survey respondents about toxicants in tobacco products that are linked to health hazards and environmental pollution. These results are important in strengthening existing policy considering adverse health effects of toxicants examined. Progressive Agriculture 31 (3): 130-143, 2020


Author(s):  
Tomas Gabriel Bas

This article highlights the relevance of the nutraceutical industry and the implication of biotechnology and nutrigenomics in the field of human health, to increase the quality and range of scope of their products. People in the world take every day functional foods constituted by nutraceutical ingredients. Only in the United States, 47% of men and 50% of women take daily vitamin complexes, inorganic nutrients and other food supplements that are made from nutraceutical ingredients. The article analyzes the nutraceutical industry in the leading countries worldwide. The number of existing companies in this sector is examined, in addition to analyzing the intellectual property generated by this industry. At the same time, it deepens in the number of patents assigned to the enterprises and the scientific publications consigned to each author (particularly to “star scientist”) is observed. Finally, the regulations and policies concerning nutraceuticals products of the different countries are analyzed.


2017 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 552 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prasanta Kumar Ghosh

The invention and use of a large number of biologics during the last three decades for treating various deficiencies and chronic disorders has resulted in great benefit to human health. Abundant use of these biologics has been considerably constrained due to the reasons of their increased prices, charged by the inventors up to the time up to which their use were/are protected by intellectual property rights (IPR).Some of these biologics are presently being manufactured by the existing and newer companies as “similar biologics” after the IPR on these products have expired and as a result the prices of several such medicines are coming down.“Similar biologics” are also referred to as “biosimilars” and other related names in different parts of the world. The regulatory authorities of different countries have authorized use of “similar biologics” based on comparative evaluation of each of such medicines with the inventor’s biologics; these are approved when considered to be closely similar to the inventor’s biologics in properties, quality and efficacy. By 2020, a dozen of “inventor’s biologicals” having estimated market sale-value of over USD 79 billion are going out of protection of IPR. This would drive entrepreneurs to enter in to the field and the prices are going to crash considerably due to market competition. In course of time more “biosimilars” would go out of IPR. Different proactive governments and the regulatory agencies all over the world are trying to harness the existing and future opportunities by creating regulatory guidelines to ease faster authorization for use of “similar biologics” in their territories. Up to the present time, a small number of “similar biologics” have been approved for use in different countries all over the major parts of the world. More efficient technologies for manufacture of “similar biologics” are also getting developed. Together, these efforts are anticipated to ease the availability of “similar biologics” at more affordable prices to the users/ payers the world over. This article is open to POST-PUBLICATION REVIEW. Registered readers (see “For Readers”) may comment by clicking on ABSTRACT on the issue’s contents page.


2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-124
Author(s):  
Naoya HIRATA ◽  
Yasunari KANDA
Keyword(s):  

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 8547-8559
Author(s):  
Hongjing Zhao ◽  
Yu Wang ◽  
Mengyao Mu ◽  
Menghao Guo ◽  
Hongxian Yu ◽  
...  

Antibiotics are used worldwide to treat diseases in humans and other animals; most of them and their secondary metabolites are discharged into the aquatic environment, posing a serious threat to human health.


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