WTO 'making headway' with Covid-19 TRIPS waiver proposal
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) believes some progress has been made in trying to break the barriers of intellectual property during the Covid-19 pandemic.
This comes after many countries of the developing world slammed richer countries and big pharmaceutical companies for monopolising vaccine production.
Since then, the WTO has proposed an agreement that would see vaccine manufacturers share their knowledge and technology.
The Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) waiver has been touted as a major step in the right direction to help scale up the manufacturing and supply of lifesaving Covid-19 medical tools across the world.
South Africa's ambassador to WTO Xolelwa Mlumbi-Peter says work is being done to amend the proposal to best match the demand.
"There has been a concern that the waiver is quite broad but, in our view, it is not broad, it is quite targeted, and we needed to clarify that," says Mlumbi-Peter.
"In the new text what we have also clarified is that the waiver will be limited to health products and technologies that are required for the prevention, treatment as well as containment of Covid-19 and we also acknowledged that this involves a range of products including diagnostics, therapeutics, vaccines, medical devices as well as personal protective equipment.
"The scope would also cover patents, industrial designs, copyright as well as the protection of undisclosed information."
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She adds once approved by all WTO members, the agreement would be in place only temporarily.
"We have put forward now that the waiver would be applicable for at least three years and the three years is informed a number of research that shows that it will take three to seven years for the global population to be vaccinated or at least for us to be able to reach global immunity.”
Negotiations are expected to be ramped-up in the coming weeks.
"Our hope is that we should conclude before the Summer break, which is normally end of July here in Geneva. We should be able to conclude those negotiations so that we are able to report progress and make recommendations to the general public.
"All members do recognise that this is a matter that affects human lives, and we hope that members will engage in good faith, solution-orientated discussions towards that objective," says Mlumbi Peters.
