From sales of medicines to impact on peoples’ lives, the Medicines Patent Pool’s work is a game-changer in the access to treatments space.
patent holders with MPP signed agreements
generic manufacturers and product developers have had sublicences from MPP
Estimating the impact of our work: uptake, economics, and public health
With billions of doses of treatments supplied through access-oriented voluntary licensing since 2010, the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) has had tremendous impact.
Through a rigorous impact assessment methodology1, MPP makes annual estimations of what its work means in terms of economic and health benefits for people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). This helps quantify the money and lives saved by MPP and its partners.
To calculate its impact, MPP compares the difference between having an MPP licence and not having an MPP licence (i.e. factual and counter-factual scenarios). Using country-level modelling which is then aggregated at global level, MPP’s methodology assumes that more optimal health products are supplied and made available to more people because they become cheaper thanks to generic competition enabled by MPP licences for these products, and that, in turn, this increased uptake creates positive economic and health impact. In other words, thanks to MPP licences, more people are able to live healthier, longer lives, and this is achieved with less public health funding than would otherwise have been needed.
The impact of MPP’s work is enabled by numerous partners: patent holders, generic manufacturers, procurement agencies, funders, governments, civil society, and communities of people affected by HIV, HCV, COVID-19, and other diseases. This impact is part of broader global health efforts to roll out optimal treatments in LMICs for which our licensees are key contributors. Together, we recognise and thank all these partners for their contribution in enabling the collective impact of products supplied by MPP licensees, as well as the direct, incremental impact of MPP licences more specifically.
Since 2010, billions of doses of treatment have been produced and supplied by MPP-enabled generic manufacturers. The patient-reach and health impact of these products supplied is far-reaching.
To calculate this collective impact, MPP’s models assume that these products would not otherwise have been available, and users would have either not accessed treatment at all or would have only been able to access the next best option available. The results show that, as a result of the optimal WHO-recommended products supplied by MPP licensees, millions of people have had access to (better) treatments and have been able to live healthier and longer lives.
MPP’s impact methodology places an emphasis on exploring the incremental effects of MPP licences over and above what would have otherwise happened in the absence of MPP. As such, MPP is able to estimate the direct contribution of its licences in growing the overall number of people on treatment (as an increment of the overall patient-reach of products supplied by its licensees – see table 1). Based on these estimated additional uptake numbers, MPP is then also able to calculate:
MPP’s impact models allow estimation of impact achieved so far (taking advantage of drug supply data obtained from MPP licensees), as well as projections into the future (using the best available treatment uptake forecasts, showcasing the benefits of long-term management of existing MPP licences).
A benefit-cost ratio for the global health community of financially supporting MPP is calculated by comparing the benefits (i.e costs saved so far and until the end of the current funding cycle in 2025) with the cost of investing in MPP for work in the HIV, HCV, TB, and COVID-19 spaces. This work has been funded by Unitaid since 2010, with the Japanese Government and the Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation (SDC) also funding MPP’s work in relation to COVID-19. The continuous increase seen for the cumulative benefit-cost ratio reflects the importance of long-term effects of MPP licences, brought by enduring MPP-led licence management until patent expiry.
Access KPMG’s statement on end of 2024 MPP data
[1] The MPP’s impact assessment methodology was developed with technical support from Cambridge Economic Policy Associates (CEPA) and funding from Unitaid. The methodology was published in The Lancet Public Health in 2021 in a research article entitled The economic and public health impact of intellectual property licensing of medicines for low-income and middle-income countries: a modelling study
[2] MPP’s impact methodology estimates low, central and high scenarios for impact. Here, the central scenario projections are provided first, with the low-high scenario projections presented in brackets.
[3] This indicator looks at the investment (or additional expenditure) that would have been needed for the same level of optimal drug uptake in absence of MPP. This is what the global health community would have had to invest to advance health in the same way (i.e. by procuring the same volumes of licensed drugs at higher prices).
[4] This indicator reports on the actual financial savings for governments, funders, procurement agencies, and other buyers and implementers brought by accessing MPP-licensed products compared to a scenario where these would not have been licensed by MPP. These are the actual cost savings that MPP licences have enabled.