Pro Bono Pharma?
This week’s Economist features an article about OneWorldHealth, the first not-for-profit pharmaceutical company in America, which is located in the Bay Area and targets third world diseases. Why is this so important? “About 90% of the planet’s disease burden falls on the developing world. Yet only 3% of the research and development expenditure of the pharmaceutical industry is directed toward those ailments. The rest goes towards treating diseases of the rich. ”
Another thing that caught my eye was the way the director was described as having “arm-twist[ed] researchers to contribute their expertise to the development process pro bono“. As much as there is to criticize about the legal profession, the institutionalization of pro bono work is one thing it gets right. But why should it only be the legal profession? Couldn’t– and shouldn’t– it be adopted by other fields as well? It would be interesting to look into the history of how pro bono work was initially incorporated into legal culture, and what the rationale was (or has evolved to be). Surely many of the reasons for instituting pro bono requirements in firm life are equally applicable to other fields…
