Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, international access to COVID-19 vaccines and other health technologies has remained highly asymmetric. This inequity has had a particularly deleterious impact on low- and middle-income countries, engaging concerns about the human rights to health and to the equal e...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Harvard FXB Center for Health and Human Rights
2020-12-01
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| Series: | Health and Human Rights |
| Online Access: | https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/2469/2022/12/kohler.pdf |
| _version_ | 1828086759645249536 |
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| author | Jillian Kohler Anna Wong Lauren Tailor |
| author_facet | Jillian Kohler Anna Wong Lauren Tailor |
| author_sort | Jillian Kohler |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, international access to COVID-19 vaccines and other health technologies has remained highly asymmetric. This inequity has had a particularly deleterious impact on low- and middle-income countries, engaging concerns about the human rights to health and to the equal enjoyment of the benefits of scientific progress enshrined under articles 12 and 15 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In response, the relationship between intellectual property rights and public health has reemerged as a subject of global interest. In October 2020, a wholesale waiver of the copyright, patent, industrial design, and undisclosed information sections of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS Agreement) was proposed by India and South Africa as a legal mechanism to increase access to affordable COVID-19 medical products. Here, we identify and evaluate the TRIPS waiver positions of World Trade Organization (WTO) members and other key stakeholders throughout the waiver’s 20-month period of negotiation at the WTO. In doing so, we find that most stakeholders declined to explicitly contextualize the TRIPS waiver within the human right to health and that historical stakeholder divisions on the relationship between intellectual property and access to medicines appear largely unchanged since the early 2000s HIV/AIDS crisis. Given the WTO’s consensus-based decision-making process, this illuminates key challenges faced by policy makers seeking to leverage the international trading system to improve equitable access to health technologies. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-11T05:00:03Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-9956abad1b754b6496926730b1e348d6 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2150-4113 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-11T05:00:03Z |
| publishDate | 2020-12-01 |
| publisher | Harvard FXB Center for Health and Human Rights |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Health and Human Rights |
| spelling | doaj.art-9956abad1b754b6496926730b1e348d62022-12-26T03:13:12ZengHarvard FXB Center for Health and Human RightsHealth and Human Rights2150-41132020-12-01242159175Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry StakeholdersJillian Kohler0Anna WongLauren TailorA professor at the University of Toronto Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, and Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, Toronto, Canada, and founding director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Governance, Accountability and Transparency in the Pharmaceutical Sector.Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, international access to COVID-19 vaccines and other health technologies has remained highly asymmetric. This inequity has had a particularly deleterious impact on low- and middle-income countries, engaging concerns about the human rights to health and to the equal enjoyment of the benefits of scientific progress enshrined under articles 12 and 15 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In response, the relationship between intellectual property rights and public health has reemerged as a subject of global interest. In October 2020, a wholesale waiver of the copyright, patent, industrial design, and undisclosed information sections of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS Agreement) was proposed by India and South Africa as a legal mechanism to increase access to affordable COVID-19 medical products. Here, we identify and evaluate the TRIPS waiver positions of World Trade Organization (WTO) members and other key stakeholders throughout the waiver’s 20-month period of negotiation at the WTO. In doing so, we find that most stakeholders declined to explicitly contextualize the TRIPS waiver within the human right to health and that historical stakeholder divisions on the relationship between intellectual property and access to medicines appear largely unchanged since the early 2000s HIV/AIDS crisis. Given the WTO’s consensus-based decision-making process, this illuminates key challenges faced by policy makers seeking to leverage the international trading system to improve equitable access to health technologies.https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/2469/2022/12/kohler.pdf |
| spellingShingle | Jillian Kohler Anna Wong Lauren Tailor Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders Health and Human Rights |
| title | Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders |
| title_full | Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders |
| title_fullStr | Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders |
| title_full_unstemmed | Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders |
| title_short | Improving Access to COVID-19 Vaccines: An Analysis of TRIPS Waiver Discourse among WTO Members, Civil Society Organizations, and Pharmaceutical Industry Stakeholders |
| title_sort | improving access to covid 19 vaccines an analysis of trips waiver discourse among wto members civil society organizations and pharmaceutical industry stakeholders |
| url | https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/2469/2022/12/kohler.pdf |
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