Next week, the International Health Economics Association (iHEA) is organizing its biannual congress at Boston University (MA, USA). The topic is “Revolutions in the Economics of Health Systems”. During a session on Health Care Supply, I will discuss if the Orphan Drug (OD) market exclusivity (ME) extend or not the drug patent monopoly. To address this question, we cross match OD designations registered at FDA with drug patent information. Results indicate that OD ME provision doesn’t extend so much the patent monopoly.   Therefore, the true advantage of the OD designation status might not be the ME or the OD ME is not efficient as we might think …