Health Impact Fund—Raising Issues of Distribution, IP Rights And Alliances

In this piece, the authors raise several issues with the public health financing proposal called the Health Impact Fund. It questions the relative distribution of costs and benefits; the persistent issue of intellectual property rights; as well as a lack of alliance with existing efforts to increase innovation of and access to essential medicines for the poor.

On 7 September, Professor Thomas Pogge addressed the Annual Conference of the Human Development and Capabilities Association (HDCA) and presented his Health Impact Fund (HIF) proposal. It was an inspiring and provocative lecture about one of the greatest injustices of our times – poverty related deaths. We find much merit in the proposal as a practical remedy to this global injustice, but also some concerns. We raise here for discussion issues of distribution, intellectual property rights, and alliances...