Liberal Senators Ask US to Push for Vaccine IP Waiver
Nine liberal senators, led by Democrats Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont, want the U.S. to push Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the European Union to agree to an Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) waiver at the World Trade Organization, so that COVID-19 vaccine production can accelerate in Asia, Latin America and Africa.
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In their letter to President Joe Biden, the senators said U.S. and European vaccine manufacturers are not on track to meet the 11 billion doses needed for a 70% worldwide vaccination goal that the president announced in September. They said at the current rate it would take three years to get there.
The U.S. and the EU nations "have provided billions to pharmaceutical companies for the development and distribution of the most effective vaccines. Despite this public investment, the intellectual property is now privately held, pitting pharmaceutical profits against public health interests. If the TRIPS rules remain in force as an obstacle to public health, even in the face of a global pandemic that has claimed more than five million lives, then such rules are clearly ill-conceived. The fallout from a failure to provide a waiver could deliver a possibly fatal blow to the WTO’s credibility," they wrote.
They said the EU proposal to clarify the permitted compulsory licensing during a pandemic is a distraction and would not provide the kind of ramp-up needed. "According to media reports, a summary of a September 14, 2021 meeting of the TRIPS Council at the WTO suggested that the United States does not support the Indian and South African proposal as it currently stands. If the U.S. does not support the Indian and South African proposal as-is, then we must engage actively and productively with other WTO members to develop a meaningful waiver text that can be adopted at the November 30 Ministerial Conference."