WTO okays vaccine-patent waiver to help fight Covid-19
Decision a blow to makers of mRNA jabs but not a meaningful move due to glut of doses
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GENEVA • The World Trade Organisation (WTO) approved a politically important deal yesterday to water down intellectual property (IP) restrictions for the manufacture of Covid-19 vaccines.
It follows an almost two-year effort involving scores of high-level meetings and much political arm-twisting.
During the early morning hours in Geneva, WTO ministers approved a package of agreements that included the vaccine patent waiver, which director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala previously said was necessary to end the "morally unacceptable" inequity of access to Covid-19 vaccines.
The last-minute deal - secured after an all-night negotiating session - is an important victory for Mrs Okonjo-Iweala, the former head of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. She actively stumped for the accord during her first year as the WTO's top trade official.
At the same time, the deal delivers a significant blow to vaccine manufacturers such as Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca, which fought hard to prevent nations from undermining the IP framework that enabled them to produce several Covid-19 vaccines in record time, saving countless lives.
"The premise of an intellectual-property waiver for Covid-19 vaccines was flawed from the outset," said Mr Thomas Cueni, the director-general of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations. "To this day, there is no evidence that IP has been a barrier to Covid-19 vaccine production or access."
The debate overcame a protracted fight between the United States and China over the Biden administration's demand that China be clearly excluded from the deal, for fear that it would enable Beijing to steal American technology.
Vaccines have become a flashpoint for trade protectionism and many US policymakers want to prevent China from obtaining access to the mRNA technology that Pfizer, BioNTech and Moderna used to produce Covid-19 inoculations. Though the Biden administration supported the idea of waiving IP rights for a vaccine, it never offered full-throated support for the deal until it emerged in the early hours in Geneva.
The deal will likely result in heavy political blowback from the US pharmaceutical sector and from Republican lawmakers who oppose it.
In recent weeks, US Trade Representative Katherine Tai found herself targeted by her former Capitol Hill colleagues for negotiating a back-room deal that many lawmakers feared would undermine American innovation.
Ultimately, the negotiations took so long and the global vaccine manufacturing effort worked so quickly that the WTO's final deal will not have a meaningful impact on the production of Covid-19 jabs, as there is a global glut of them.
As at May, there were 2.1 billion excess doses of Covid-19 vaccines and their production has consistently outpaced the number of doses administered.
"There is no longer a supply-side constraint on the availability of vaccines," said Mr Chad Bown, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
BLOOMBERG
Some of the deals reached
The World Trade Organisation's (WTO) 164 members approved a series of agreements early yesterday that included commitments on fish and pledges on food security after more than five gruelling days of negotiations.
Here are some details on the deals reached.
PANDEMIC RESPONSE
Developing countries will be allowed to authorise the use of a patent for production and supply without the patent holder's consent for five years. China has voluntarily opted out of the waiver, which the United States had insisted on.
FISHING
WTO members struck an agreement to reduce subsidies that contribute to over-fishing, a step that is vital to helping fish stocks recover. Talks have been going on for 20 years.
The agreement says that no WTO member shall grant any subsidy for vessels or operators engaged in illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing or for fishing of an over-fished stock. Developing countries will be exempt for two years.
FOOD SECURITY
WTO members agreed in a declaration that they would take concrete steps to facilitate trade of food and agriculture, including cereals, fertilisers and other agricultural inputs, and reaffirmed the importance of limiting export restrictions.
They also agreed to a binding decision not to curb exports to the World Food Programme, which seeks to fight hunger in places hit by conflicts, disasters and climate change.
E-COMMERCE MORATORIUM
WTO members have extended a moratorium on placing Customs duties on electronic transmissions, from streaming services to financial transactions and corporate data flows, worth hundreds of billions of dollars a year.
The moratorium has been in place since 1998. South Africa and India had initially opposed an extension, saying they should not be missing out on Customs revenues.
REUTERS
