Pharmaceutical patenting and the transformation of American medical ethics

The attitudes of physicians and drug manufacturers in the US toward patenting pharmaceuticals changed dramatically from the mid-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth. Formerly, physicians and reputable manufacturers argued that pharmaceutical patents prioritized profit over the advancement of medi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The British journal for the history of science 2016-12, Vol.49 (4), p.577-600
Main Author: GABRIEL, JOSEPH M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
American history
American Medical Association - history
Commerce - ethics
Commerce - history
Culture
Drugs
Ethics
Ethics, Medical - history
History of medicine and histology
History, 19th Century
History, 20th Century
Medical ethics
Patents as Topic - ethics
Patents as Topic - history
Pharmaceutical Preparations - economics
Pharmaceutical Preparations - history
Pharmaceuticals
Physicians
Prohibition
Science history
Transformations
United States
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Summary:The attitudes of physicians and drug manufacturers in the US toward patenting pharmaceuticals changed dramatically from the mid-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth. Formerly, physicians and reputable manufacturers argued that pharmaceutical patents prioritized profit over the advancement of medical science. Reputable manufactures refused to patent their goods and most physicians shunned patented products. However, moving into the early twentieth century, physicians and drug manufacturers grew increasingly comfortable with the idea of pharmaceutical patents. In 1912, for example, the American Medical Association dropped the prohibition on physicians holding medical patents. Shifts in wider patenting cultures therefore transformed the ethical sensibilities of physicians.
ISSN:0007-0874
1474-001X
DOI:10.1017/S0007087416001138