Anti-competition in Pharma, pt. 2

Earlier this week, the Washington Post reported:

Some at the FDA, as well as leaders in the generic drug industry, complain that "citizen petitions" -- requests for agency action that any individual, group or company can file -- are being misused by brand-name drugmakers to stave off generic competition.

The simple act of filing a petition, they say, triggers another round of time-consuming and often redundant reviews of the generics by the FDA, which can take months or years. In the process, consumers continue to pay millions of dollars more for the brand-name drugs.

I'm shocked! Are you telling me that Big Pharma is playing the system?

Here's a novel idea: change the system of drug intellectual property to one of copyright. The typical response to this is that there would be reduced incentive to produce new drugs. Perhaps, but I think that there's enough money in healthcare (15% of GDP!) that advertising rights is enough incentive. Furthermore, we can get past this silly system that allows ownership of a molecule!