Function

• By protecting medical research and pharmaceutical breakthroughs, the inventors of these ideas gain protection from idea theft while they develop their products and in the years after their release. A patent helps a company to recover the fiscal investment of producing a new medicine. Without the chance to make a profit, drug companies cannot afford to produce new medications.
  
  

Significance

• Medical research is largely responsible for forming new medical discoveries as well as creating new medications and antibiotics. This research can also result in medical breakthroughs.
  
  

Features

• "Today, creating a single new medication costs, on average, about one billion dollars," says Miles White, CEO of Abbot Laboratories. This monumental funding comes only from private investors. Without a guarantee of a return on their investment, that financing will go somewhere else.
  
  

Identification

• Drug patents are simple in to other patents. For example, it is just as easy to patent a new drug as it is to patent a new invention. Pharmaceutical patents normally last 11.7 years, which covers the process between market entry and patent expiration.
  
  

The Facts

• The intention of a drug patent is to protect the investments of medical researchers as they create and disperse new medications.