Intellectual Property Protection Of Traditional Medicine

With the rapid development of science and technology, the merits of traditional medicine are revealed during the current medical practice. As a result, some organizations in the developed world improperly utilize the traditional medicine of the developing countries and generate profits out of it. However, the people from the traditional medicine origins did not get the reward they should have, which is unfair at any rate. Thus, the affected developing countries call for systematic intellectual property rights (IPR) protection of traditional medicine. Currently there are discussions on the necessity and applicability of the IPR protection of traditional medicine. This article mainly discusses the potential modes of IPR protection of traditional medicine on the premise that the protection is needed and applicable. The article is divided into 5 chapters.Chapter 1 analyzes the current definitions of traditional medicine and clarifies the concept of traditional medicine. It also analyzes the reasons of proposing IPR protection.Chapter 2 reveals the interconnected and conflicting relationship between traditional medicine and current IPR protection systems. Some of the traditional medicines are up to standards of current IPR rules and regulations and can be effectively protected by current systems. However, there are a great deal of traditional medicines are out of protection due to the conflicts between their characteristics and current protection rules and regulations, which leads to a interconnected while conflicting status. The importance of this chapter is to thoroughly analyze the relationship between the traditional medicine and current protection mechanics, bringing up the discussion on appropriate protection mechanics and educing the proper option.Chapter 3 extends the analysis of current traditional medicine's IPR protection and compares two different protection practices, identifying their advantages and disadvantages. The most appropriate and comprehensive protection mode is to maintaining the current rules and regulations while proposing special mechanics as complement. Chapter 4 further elaborates current traditional medicine IPR protection mode. It also illustrates how to effectively utilize the current mechanics to protect the up-to-standard traditional medicine IPR. At the same time, recommendations for improvement are made to lower the threshold of protection and extend the protection range.Chapter 5 analyzes the special IPR protection mechanics, identifying the beneficiary system, database system, source of origin track record, informed consent system and benefit sharing system. In this chapter, the author also provides recommendations on how to build up and improve the above mentioned systems while analyzes the coordination and applicability of the current and the special protection systems.The final conclusion summarizes the findings and the outcomes of analyses, strengthening the topic of the thesis.