As for-profit entities, pharmaceutical corporations are primarily interested in profits, not global health. That explains his vehement opposition to a waiver.
The only way to end the COVID-19 pandemic is to immunize enough people around the world. The slogan “no one is safe until everyone is safe” captures the epidemiological reality we face. Outbreaks anywhere could spread a vaccine-resistant variant of SARS-CoV-2, forcing us all to return to some form of confinement. Given the emergence of worrisome new mutations in India, Brazil, South Africa, the UK and elsewhere, this is not a mere theoretical threat.
Worse still, vaccine production is currently nowhere near providing the 10-15 billion doses needed to stop the spread of the virus. By the end of May, only 2.1 billion doses had been produced worldwide. At this rate, hundreds of millions of people in developing countries will remain unimmunized until at least 2023.
So it’s great news that the administration of US President Joe Biden has announced that it will join the other 100 countries seeking an emergency COVID-19 exemption from the US’s intellectual property (IP) rules. World Trade Organization that have allowed the monopolization of vaccines in all this time. Timely negotiations for a WTO agreement temporarily removing these barriers would create the legal certainty that governments and manufacturers around the world need to increase production of vaccines, treatments and diagnostics.
Last fall, former President Donald Trump recruited a handful of allies from rich countries to block any such waiver negotiations. But the pressure on the Biden administration to reverse this counterproductive lockdown has been growing and has managed to rally the support of 200 Nobel laureates and former heads of state and government (including many prominent neoliberal figures), 110 members of the US House of Representatives. The United States, ten US senators, 400 US civil society groups, 400 European parliamentarians, and many others.
Follow the news of El Espectador on Google NewsAn unnecessary problem
The COVID-19 vaccine shortage in the developing world is essentially the result of efforts by vaccine manufacturers to maintain their monopoly control and profits. Pfizer and Moderna, the makers of extremely effective mRNA vaccines, have refused or failed to respond to numerous requests from qualified pharmaceutical manufacturers wanting to produce their vaccines. And not a single vaccine originator has shared its technologies with poor countries through the World Health Organization’s voluntary Pool Access to Technology against COVID-19.
(You can also read: Vaccine tourism: activating the economy or inequality? )
Recent promises by companies to make vaccine doses available to the COVID-19 Global Access to Vaccines (COVAX) program, which will deliver them to the highest-risk populations in the poorest countries, are no substitute. These promises may alleviate the guilt of pharmaceutical companies, but they do not significantly increase the global offering.
As for-profit entities, pharmaceutical corporations are primarily interested in profits, not global health. Your goal is simple: maintain as much market power as possible for as long as possible to maximize profits. In these circumstances, it is up to governments to intervene more directly to solve the problem of vaccine supply.
A sensible solution
In recent weeks, legions of pharmaceutical lobbyists have invaded Washington to pressure political leaders to block the WTO COVID-19 exemption. If the industry were as committed to producing more doses of vaccines as it is to generating deceptive arguments, the supply problem might already be solved.
Rather, drug companies have resorted to a number of contradictory arguments. They insist that a waiver is not necessary, because the existing WTO framework is flexible enough to allow access to technology. They also argue that an exemption would not be effective, because manufacturers in developing countries lack the resources to produce the vaccine.
However, drug companies also imply that a WTO waiver would be too effective. What other conclusion could be drawn from his warnings that it would undermine research incentives, reduce the profits of Western companies and – when all other arguments fail – that it would help China and Russia defeat the West geopolitically?
Obviously, an exemption would make a real difference. This is why drug companies are so vehemently opposed. The “market” also confirms this thinking, as evidenced by the sharp drop in share prices for major vaccine manufacturers following the Biden administration’s announcement that it will participate in waiver negotiations. With an exemption, more vaccines will be produced, prices will fall, and so will profits.
Still, the industry says an exemption would set a terrible precedent, so it’s worth considering their arguments one by one.
Big lies from Big Pharma
After years of fiery campaigning and millions of deaths in the HIV / AIDS epidemic, WTO countries agreed on the need for compulsory IP licenses (when governments allow domestic companies to produce a patented pharmaceutical product without consent of the patent owner) to guarantee access to medicines. But the drug companies never gave up in their efforts to undermine this principle. It is partly because of the pettiness of the pharmaceutical industry that we need an exemption to begin with. Had the prevailing pharmaceutical IP regimen been more accommodating, vaccine and treatment production would have already increased.
(You can supplement with: Patents, vaccines and leadership: the game changer )
The argument that developing countries lack the capacities to make COVID vaccines based on new technologies is false. When vaccine manufacturers in the United States and Europe entered into alliances with foreign producers, such as the Serum Institute in India (the world’s largest vaccine producer) and Aspen Pharmacare in South Africa, these organizations had not had any obvious manufacturing problems. There are many more companies and organizations around the world with the same potential to help drive vaccine supply; they just need access to technology and know-how.
For its part, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations has identified some 250 companies that could make vaccines. As the delegate of South Africa to the WTO recently observed:
“Developing countries have advanced scientific and technical capabilities… the shortage of production and supply [of vaccines] is caused by the owners of the rights themselves entering into restrictive agreements that only serve their own narrow monopoly purposes by putting profit before profit. lifetime”.
While mRNA vaccine technology may have been difficult and expensive to develop, that does not mean that actual vaccine production is not available to other companies around the world. Moderna’s own former chemistry director, Suhaib Siddiqi, has said that if technology and know-how is shared enough, many modern factories should be able to start making mRNA vaccines within three to four months.
The response of the pharmaceutical companies is to say that an exemption is not necessary in light of the existing “flexibilities” of the WTO. They point out that companies in developing countries have not sought compulsory licenses, suggesting that they are simply pretending. But this alleged lack of interest reflects the fact that Western pharmaceutical companies have gone to great lengths to create legal tangles of patents, copyrights and patented industrial design, and secret commercial “exclusivities” that existing flexibilities may never cover. As mRNA vaccines have more than 100 components globally, many with some form of IP protection, coordinating compulsory licenses between countries for this supply chain is practically impossible.
Also, according to WTO rules, compulsory licenses to export are even more complex, even if this trade is absolutely essential to increase the global supply of vaccines. Canadian pharmaceutical manufacturer Biolyse, for example, is not allowed to produce and export generic versions of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine to developing countries after J&J rejected its request for a voluntary license.
Another factor in the shortage of vaccine supply is fear, both at the corporate and national levels. Many countries fear that the United States and the European Union will cut aid or impose penalties on them if they issue compulsory licenses after decades of threatening to do so. With a WTO waiver, however, these governments and companies would be protected from corporate lawsuits, injunctions, and other challenges.
People’s vaccinations
This brings us to the third argument made by Big Pharma: that an IP exemption would reduce profits and discourage future research and development. Like the previous two arguments, this one is clearly false. A WTO waiver would not abolish national legal requirements that royalties or other forms of compensation be paid to IP owners. But by eliminating the monopolists’ option to simply block increased production, an exemption would increase the incentives for drug companies to enter into voluntary deals.
So, even with a WTO waiver, all is given for vaccine manufacturers to make tons of money. Revenue from Pfizer and Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine in 2021 alone is projected to reach $ 15 billion and $ 18.4 billion, respectively, although governments funded much of the basic research and offered substantial startup funds to take out. vaccines to the market.
(Some more on the subject here: What if patents for COVID-19 vaccines are suspended? )
To be clear: the problem for the pharmaceutical industry is not that drug manufacturers are deprived of high returns on their investments; it is that monopoly profits will be lost, including those from future annual booster vaccines that will undoubtedly be sold at high prices in rich countries.
Finally, when all their other arguments fail, the industry’s last resort is to say that a waiver would help China and Russia gain access to American technology. But this is bullshit, because vaccines are not America’s creation to begin with. Collaborative cross-country research on mRNA vaccines and their medical applications has been underway for decades. Hungarian scientist Katalin Karikó made the initial discovery in 1978, and work has since continued in Turkey, Thailand, South Africa, India, Brazil, Argentina, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and other countries, including the US National Institutes of Health. .
On the other hand, the genie has already left the bottle. The mRNA technology in the vaccine produced by Pfizer is owned by BioNTech (a German company founded by a Turkish immigrant and his wife), which has already granted the Chinese producer Fosun Pharma a license to manufacture its vaccine. While there are genuine examples of Chinese companies stealing valuable IP, this is not one of them. Furthermore, China is well advanced in the development and production of its own mRNA vaccines. One is in Phase III clinical trials; another can be stored at refrigerator temperature, eliminating the need for cold chain management.
How could America really lose
For those interested in geopolitical issues, the biggest source of concern should be the failure of the United States to date to engage in constructive diplomacy to deal with COVID-19. The United States has been blocking exports of vaccines that it is not even using. It was only when a second wave of infections that devastated India began that it considered appropriate to release its unused doses of Astra-Zeneca. Meanwhile, Russia and China have not only distributed their vaccines; They have engaged in significant technology and knowledge transfer, forging partnerships around the world and helping accelerate the global vaccination effort.
Now that daily infections continue to reach new peaks in some parts of the world, the possibility of dangerous new variants poses an increasing risk for all. The world will remember which countries helped and which countries put up stumbling blocks, during this critical time.
COVID-19 vaccines have been developed by scientists around the world, thanks to basic science backed by numerous governments. What corresponds is that the people of the world get the benefits. It is a matter of morality and of self-interest. We must not allow drug companies to put profits ahead of lives.
* Nobel Prize in Economics, university professor at Columbia University and member of the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation.
* Lori Wallach is a director of Global Trade Watch, a division of Public Citizen.
© Project Syndicate 1995–2021
