The international economic discussion on intellectual property: Relevant aspects for the Brazilian health sector - DOI: 10.3395/reciis.v3i4.293en

Discussion about the impact of the international harmonization of higher-level patent protection in the public health sector of less developed countries just started to take place after the so-called Doha Declaration. This paper advocates a more intense discussion on patents, highlighting not only that estimates of benefits and losses resulting from greater patent protection have been negligent toward the loss of monopoly that result from patents, but especially the fact that they do not take into account the raise in public health costs in less wealthy countries that results from this tendency to harmonize.