Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the government is taking to attach conditions to public research and development funding to ensure (a) equitable and (b) affordable access to the end products.

The Department invests over £1.6 billion each year on research through its research delivery arm, the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).

NIHR research contracts require recipients of NIHR funding to promote the dissemination of the intellectual property arising from NIHR research to maximise patient and public benefit. Any commercialisation of NIHR research must take due consideration of my Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care’s position regarding access to essential health related technologies, including medicines, in the developing world.

In addition, the NIHR has made research inclusion a condition of its funding. Applicants to domestic research programmes are required to demonstrate how inclusion is being built into all stages of the research lifecycle. Applicants are also required to provide details of how their research contributes towards the NIHR’s mission to reduce health and care inequalities.