This Article is based on the 2021 Shidler Lecture, which was delivered at the University of Washington School of Law on November 4, 2021. Through enormous public support and private initiative, biopharmaceutical firms have developed safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines in record time. These...

Although patents are the prototypical type of protection that most people consider applicable to protecting drugs, patents are just the most-established and well-known method available to protect drugs from competition. However, there are other types of mechanisms in regulatory laws that provide...

When the Medicare program was created in 1965, outpatient prescription drugs were left out of the benefit package, a decision that maintained consistency with standard private insurance plans of the time. Cost was one factor behind the exclusion, but a more fundamental reason related to the role...