EU voucher system would work like U.S.'s.

• Position: Drug Treatments

Drug companies may be more willing to develop treatments for neglected diseases--including malaria, tuberculosis, and leishmanaiasis--if the European Union would adopt a "priority review voucher" reward system. The vouchers would give a company accelerated regulatory review of one of its other drugs as a reward for developing a treatment for a neglected disease, maintain professor David Ridley of Duke University's School of Business, Durham, N.C., and Alfonso Calles-Sanchez, with the Spanish Patent Office and former pharmaceutical policymaker at the European Commission, who propose a European Union version of the priority review voucher system instituted in the U.S.

Although these diseases affect more than 1,000,000,000 people, they occur most frequently in developing nations, providing little financial incentive for pharmaceutical firms to create and test new treatments.

The EU voucher would provide regulatory review through the European Medicines Agency, as well as accelerated pricing and reimbursement decisions by EU member states. For instance, "if you develop a new drug for malaria, your profitable cholesterol-lowering drug could go on the market a year earlier," philanthropist Bill Gates explained at the World Economic Forum.

The U.S. voucher was proposed originally by Ridley and Duke colleagues Jeff Moe and Henry Grabowski in 2006. Legislation to create the U.S. priority review voucher system was sponsored by Sens. Sam Brownback (R.-Kan., and the newly elected governor of that state) and Sherrod Brown (D.-Ohio) and authorized by Congress in 2007.

"By allowing a company to sell its profitable drug sooner, an EU voucher system also would increase the time during which the company could enjoy patent-protected sales," Calles-Sanchez suggests. "The voucher would not, however, delay generics because it...