Trade and Access to Medicines

The Boston University Working Group on Trade Treaties and Access to Medicines was established in 2018 to advance an evidence-based understanding of the impacts of trade and investment treaties on access to medicines. The goal is to offer concrete policies and advice to help the trade and investment system be a tool in expanding global access to secure and affordable medicines.

The Working Group is a dynamic group of economists, legal scholars, medical scientists and policy analysts from around the world, which conducts empirical research exploring the relationship between treaties and pharmaceutical prices, political economy analyses of the challenges to domestic institutions in securing access to medicines and legal research on the prevalence of treaty terms increasing the global levels of intellectual property protection. Specific research projects include: research in on bilateral trade agreements and the price of biologics; global trade treaties and the price of insulin; and the ability to build local productive capacity in the pharmaceuticals industry in developing countries.

The Working Group also advances policy discourse at the World Trade Organization and at numerous regional and bilateral trade and investment treaties through direct engagement with policy makers, media, civil society and public dialogue.