Second medical use patents: a study on positive and negative arguments for granting registration in Brazil

Second medical use patents in Brazil are a controversial issue in stu-dies of industrial property rights. There are several perspectives on this theme, with positive and negative arguments for granting this sort of patents in the country. The intent of this article is to describe the main points for and against the grant of this patent by the National Institute of Industrial Property . We conceptualize these patents according to three viewpoints. Then, we point out the positive and the ne-gative arguments, explaining each one. Finally, we use a judicial decision issued by the Federal Court of the 2nd Region s as a practical example. We attempt to foster this discussion on a national leve