Incremental pharmaceutical innovation benefits Indian patients and leads to a higher quality of life, just as it has across the world. In recent years, pharmaceutical innovation has accounted for as much as 65% of new drug approvals by regulatory agencies and more than 60% of the drugs on the World Health Organization list of essential medicines. This reflects the incremental innovation of older drugs. Currently, India’s patent law [Section 3(d)] discriminates against a large portion of valuable pharmaceutical innovation.

A report released by The Coalition for Healthy India,“The Value of Incremental Pharmaceutical Innovation: Benefits for Indian Patients and Indian Business"  focuses on the impact of restrictive policies in India with respect to medical and pharmaceutical innovation. Many studies have concluded that patent protection for incremental innovation enhances further investments in research and development. The report suggests that the offending section of India’s patent law [Section 3(d)] should be changed in order to benefit Indian companies and Indian patients. The study is also intended to add a patient-centric perspective to the public discourse on intellectual property rights and highlights the positive impact that incremental innovation can have on patient care in India.

The report also points out that in India in the early 1990s, pharmaceutical R&D rose from 0.4% to as much as 4.8% by 2004. Yet by 2006, when India began to allow patents on pharmaceutical products, India’s three largest drug firms were investing between 12% and 18% of their annual sales in research and development. Extending patent protection to incremental innovation encouraged further investment, which has led to new drugs in both the Indian and global markets. This report further solidifies the importance of incremental pharmaceutical innovation and empowers efforts to help amend India’s current patent law. Collectively, through the Coalition for Healthy India and the Coalition for Innovation, Employment and Development, the GIPC has joined other industry members to support amending India’s patent law to allow for greater medical and pharmaceutical innovation as well as increased quality of patient care.