Intellectual Property Rights and Pharmaceutical Welfare in selected Southeast Asian countries
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This study examined how patent governance related to medicine affordability and access in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Viet Nam. A comparative socio-legal policy design was used. Patent legislation and documented government-use practices were reviewed alongside 2023 health-financing indicators and country-specific evidence on medicine prices, availability, affordability, and procurement. The comparison showed that all five jurisdictions retained substantial public-health flexibilities, although activation conditions and evidence of use differed. Thailand had the clearest record of government-use licensing, while Indonesia and Malaysia also provided documented examples. Welfare patterns did not map neatly onto the formal legal profiles. Countries with similar statutory tools showed different levels of out-of-pocket spending, public health financing, and medicine-specific affordability. The findings indicated that legal flexibility became relevant to pharmaceutical welfare only when institutions could convert formal authority into supply, procurement leverage, regulatory readiness, and financial protection. Patent governance was therefore treated as one part of a broader institutional architecture rather than as a direct cause of medicine access outcomes.
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