Around the world, the fight for affordable medical treatment is intensifying. Headline-grabbing battles are being waged in India, where the Chennai High Court recently decided a major constitutional case over access to lifesaving cancer medication. In Thailand, Abbott Laboratories, a multinational pharmaceutical giant, has withdrawn registration of all its new medicines as leverage in a prolonged battle with the government over drug prices and patent recognition. Huge pharmaceutical companies and foreign governments, however, are not the only players in the struggle for affordable treatment--universities, too, are at the heart of it. Universities play a critical role in medical innovation and must start using their clout to help make lifesaving medicines more affordable to poor countries. After all, universities are heavily involved in the research and development of many of those treatments. In 2006 Universities Allied for Essential Medicines, a student organization with chapters at nearly 40 universities, issued a statement calling for universities to "promote equal access to research, promote research and development for neglected diseases, and measure research success according to impact on human welfare." That document, called the Philadelphia Consensus Statement (http://www.essentialmedicine.org/cs), was signed by thousands of students and by scientists, prominent public-health officials, and several Nobel laureates.