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Indian government's problem:
Indian government's proposed "solution":
India asks WTO to suspend intellectual property rules for COVID vaccines
By Ashutosh Pandey | 04.02.2021
The World Trade Organization (WTO) talks on a proposal by India and South Africa to temporarily suspend intellectual property (IP) rules related to COVID-19 vaccines and treatments hit a roadblock on Thursday after wealthy countries balked at the idea, Germany's dpa news agency reported.
The two developing countries say the IP waiver will allow drugmakers in poor countries to start production of effective vaccines sooner.
India and South Africa had approached the global trade body in October, calling on it to waive parts of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement). The suspension of rights such as patents, industrial designs, copyright and protection of undisclosed information would ensure "timely access to affordable medical products including vaccines and medicines or to scaling-up of research, development, manufacturing and supply of medical products essential to combat COVID-19," they said.
The proposal was vehemently opposed by wealthy nations like the US and Britain as well as the European Union, who said that a ban would stifle innovation at pharmaceutical companies by robbing them of the incentive to make huge investments in research and development. This would be especially counterproductive during the current pandemic which needs the drugmakers to remain on their toes to deal with a mutating virus, they argue.
The WTO talks are taking place as some wealthy countries face criticism for cornering billions of COVID shots — many times the size of their populations — while leaving poor countries struggling for supplies. Experts say the global scramble for vaccines, or vaccine nationalism, risks prolonging the pandemic.
"We have to recognize that this virus knows no boundaries, it travels around the globe and the response to it should also be global. It should be based on international solidarity," said Ellen 't Hoen, the director of Medicines Law & Policy — a nonprofit campaigning for greater access to medicines.
"Many of the large-scale vaccine manufacturers are based in developing countries. All the production capacity that exists should be exploited…and that does require the sharing of knowhow and the technology by those who have it in their hands," she told DW.
Not enough production capacity
Supporters of the waiver, which include dozens of developing and least-developed countries and NGOs, said the WTO's IP rules were acting as a barrier to urgent scale-up of production of vaccines and other much needed medical equipment in poor countries.
Those critical of India's and South Africa's proposal argue that suspension of patents would not address the production and shortage issues currently plaguing vaccination drives globally.
"Demands for a release of patent information relating to vaccines would not increase supply by a single dose in the short term because they overlook the complexity of vaccine manufacture and ignore the extent to which vaccine manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies and developing nations already cooperate in order to ramp up vaccination capacities," Thomas Cueni, the general director of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA), told DW.
"The euphoria over the development of highly effective vaccines has somehow created the impression that once a vaccine has been developed, a billion doses can roll out of the factories at the push of a button. I think we need to be aware of just how complex and difficult vaccine manufacturing is," he said.
Unprecedented collaboration
While the WTO members agreed that there was an urgent need to ensure an equitable distribution of vaccines and drugs, and that too at a swift pace, they could not agree if an IP waiver was the best way to achieve that.
The pharmaceutical industry says it was witnessing an unprecedented level of collaboration among companies, including rival, to ensure a safe and swift access to vaccines to people around the globe. They point to AstraZeneca's deal with the world's largest vaccine maker, India's Serum Institute, and Johnson & Johnson teaming up with South Africa's Aspen Pharmacare to produce its yet-to-be-approved vaccine. In addition, they said German company Bayer has signed up to help produce Germany's CureVac's mRNA-based coronavirus vaccine, and Sanofi has agreed to help rival Pfizer with the production of its vaccine developed by BioNtech.
Then there is the WHO-backed COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access (COVAX) facility, funded through donations, to ensure fair global access to coronavirus vaccines. The facility plans to distribute 2 billion doses by the end of 2021, but has struggled to gain traction.
During the online WTO talks on Thursday, a South African trade diplomat blamed wealthy nations for current vaccine shortages, dpa reported, citing anonymous participants.
He said Western pharmaceutical companies had granted production licenses to a small number of firms, even though countries such as Cuba, Indonesia, Senegal and Thailand are also capable of making vaccines, the news agency reported.
https://m.dw.com/en/rich-countries-...s-bid-to-ban-covid-vaccine-patents/a-56460175
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UPDATE: Biden got roped in by Modi:
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My take: Ofcourse India would lead the charge, consider that they have become the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturer by mass-producing generic copies of the medicines and vaccines developed in the West that are no longer under patent protection.
Now they are going one step further and ask the WTO to suspend the Intellectual Properties rights for the MRNA vaccines as well, in the name of humanity (and a healthy dose of profit selling innovations from the West - without any related R&D costs or licensing fees - to all the countries that don't have the capabilities to produce them).
Note: India already have the licenses to locally-produce the AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Novavax vaccines, but their government chose to sit on their hands and didn't place orders with the Serum Institute of India until 2 months ago, when their country is already swirling down the Wave 2 toilet bowl.
Unsurprisingly, the countries where billions in public and private funding were invested into the COVID vaccines' research & development, building the advanced high-tech infrastructure for their mass production, and deliver them to the world in record time are resisting India's demand to get their intellectual property rights for free, arguing that:
1) suspending patents protection does absolutely NOTHING to improve the global supply chain, since very few facilities in the world (all of which are in the U.S and Europe) are advanced enough to produce cutting-edge MRNA vaccines,
2) The know-how required don't just fall out of the sky without the proper training, and
3) if there's no one willing to invest in innovations, there wouldn't be anymore innovations.
India vaccine shortage will last months because Indian government failed to prepare for second wave
By Shweta Sharma | May 3, 2021
Serum Institute of India's Adar Poonawalla
By Shweta Sharma | May 3, 2021
Serum Institute of India's Adar Poonawalla
Indian government's proposed "solution":
India asks WTO to suspend intellectual property rules for COVID vaccines
By Ashutosh Pandey | 04.02.2021
The World Trade Organization (WTO) talks on a proposal by India and South Africa to temporarily suspend intellectual property (IP) rules related to COVID-19 vaccines and treatments hit a roadblock on Thursday after wealthy countries balked at the idea, Germany's dpa news agency reported.
The two developing countries say the IP waiver will allow drugmakers in poor countries to start production of effective vaccines sooner.
India and South Africa had approached the global trade body in October, calling on it to waive parts of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement). The suspension of rights such as patents, industrial designs, copyright and protection of undisclosed information would ensure "timely access to affordable medical products including vaccines and medicines or to scaling-up of research, development, manufacturing and supply of medical products essential to combat COVID-19," they said.
The proposal was vehemently opposed by wealthy nations like the US and Britain as well as the European Union, who said that a ban would stifle innovation at pharmaceutical companies by robbing them of the incentive to make huge investments in research and development. This would be especially counterproductive during the current pandemic which needs the drugmakers to remain on their toes to deal with a mutating virus, they argue.
The WTO talks are taking place as some wealthy countries face criticism for cornering billions of COVID shots — many times the size of their populations — while leaving poor countries struggling for supplies. Experts say the global scramble for vaccines, or vaccine nationalism, risks prolonging the pandemic.
"We have to recognize that this virus knows no boundaries, it travels around the globe and the response to it should also be global. It should be based on international solidarity," said Ellen 't Hoen, the director of Medicines Law & Policy — a nonprofit campaigning for greater access to medicines.
"Many of the large-scale vaccine manufacturers are based in developing countries. All the production capacity that exists should be exploited…and that does require the sharing of knowhow and the technology by those who have it in their hands," she told DW.
Not enough production capacity
Supporters of the waiver, which include dozens of developing and least-developed countries and NGOs, said the WTO's IP rules were acting as a barrier to urgent scale-up of production of vaccines and other much needed medical equipment in poor countries.
Those critical of India's and South Africa's proposal argue that suspension of patents would not address the production and shortage issues currently plaguing vaccination drives globally.
"Demands for a release of patent information relating to vaccines would not increase supply by a single dose in the short term because they overlook the complexity of vaccine manufacture and ignore the extent to which vaccine manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies and developing nations already cooperate in order to ramp up vaccination capacities," Thomas Cueni, the general director of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA), told DW.
"The euphoria over the development of highly effective vaccines has somehow created the impression that once a vaccine has been developed, a billion doses can roll out of the factories at the push of a button. I think we need to be aware of just how complex and difficult vaccine manufacturing is," he said.
Unprecedented collaboration
While the WTO members agreed that there was an urgent need to ensure an equitable distribution of vaccines and drugs, and that too at a swift pace, they could not agree if an IP waiver was the best way to achieve that.
The pharmaceutical industry says it was witnessing an unprecedented level of collaboration among companies, including rival, to ensure a safe and swift access to vaccines to people around the globe. They point to AstraZeneca's deal with the world's largest vaccine maker, India's Serum Institute, and Johnson & Johnson teaming up with South Africa's Aspen Pharmacare to produce its yet-to-be-approved vaccine. In addition, they said German company Bayer has signed up to help produce Germany's CureVac's mRNA-based coronavirus vaccine, and Sanofi has agreed to help rival Pfizer with the production of its vaccine developed by BioNtech.
Then there is the WHO-backed COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access (COVAX) facility, funded through donations, to ensure fair global access to coronavirus vaccines. The facility plans to distribute 2 billion doses by the end of 2021, but has struggled to gain traction.
During the online WTO talks on Thursday, a South African trade diplomat blamed wealthy nations for current vaccine shortages, dpa reported, citing anonymous participants.
He said Western pharmaceutical companies had granted production licenses to a small number of firms, even though countries such as Cuba, Indonesia, Senegal and Thailand are also capable of making vaccines, the news agency reported.
https://m.dw.com/en/rich-countries-...s-bid-to-ban-covid-vaccine-patents/a-56460175
-----
UPDATE: Biden got roped in by Modi:
-----
My take: Ofcourse India would lead the charge, consider that they have become the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturer by mass-producing generic copies of the medicines and vaccines developed in the West that are no longer under patent protection.
Now they are going one step further and ask the WTO to suspend the Intellectual Properties rights for the MRNA vaccines as well, in the name of humanity (and a healthy dose of profit selling innovations from the West - without any related R&D costs or licensing fees - to all the countries that don't have the capabilities to produce them).
Note: India already have the licenses to locally-produce the AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Novavax vaccines, but their government chose to sit on their hands and didn't place orders with the Serum Institute of India until 2 months ago, when their country is already swirling down the Wave 2 toilet bowl.
Unsurprisingly, the countries where billions in public and private funding were invested into the COVID vaccines' research & development, building the advanced high-tech infrastructure for their mass production, and deliver them to the world in record time are resisting India's demand to get their intellectual property rights for free, arguing that:
1) suspending patents protection does absolutely NOTHING to improve the global supply chain, since very few facilities in the world (all of which are in the U.S and Europe) are advanced enough to produce cutting-edge MRNA vaccines,
2) The know-how required don't just fall out of the sky without the proper training, and
3) if there's no one willing to invest in innovations, there wouldn't be anymore innovations.
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