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Geneva: As the ongoing ministerial conference at the World Trade Organization got extended by a day amid lack of consensus on key issues, nearly 150 civil society organisations from across the globe have urged trade ministers to reject the current draft text on patents waiver at the WTO, and negotiate an “effective and meaningful" intellectual property rights waiver on all covid-19 medical products for all people.
The deal based on the current draft text will be largely ineffective given that it excludes Covid-19 medicines and diagnostics and is only limited to patents, the organisations said in a letter.
“The draft Ministerial Decision on the Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement is inadequate and contradictory to the WTO’s foundational principles… We therefore call on you, as Trade Ministers, to not accept this current text and demand a real and effective TRIPS Waiver, as originally proposed," read the letter.
Highlighting that people continue to die from Covid-19 without access to life-saving treatments, it said that it was indefensible that the draft ministerial decision does not immediately apply to all Covid-19 medical tools, including therapeutics and diagnostics. “The failure of the text to address intellectual property barriers beyond patents severely limits its effectiveness in increasing production and supply," said the letter.
The letter is signed by 150 civil society organisations including Amnesty International. Oxfam, ActionAid Australia, ACT Alliance EU, Public Eye, and People’s Vaccine Alliance.
This comes a day after World Health Organisation (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged member countries to arrive at a consensus on intellectual property rights waiver also on medicines and diagnostics.
“…the TRIPS waiver was created for use in emergencies. So if not now, then when? I hope countries will come to an agreement on a waiver not just for vaccines, but for diagnostics and therapeutics as well," said the WHO chief.
The current draft text only limits IPR waiver to patents for Covid-19 vaccines.
The civil society organisations in the letter said that the draft ministerial decision was inadequate and does not deliver a meaningful global response to the pandemic.
“The draft Ministerial Decision is discriminatory as it arbitrarily excludes some of the world’s largest producers of medical tools and “encourages developing countries with export capacity to opt out" from using the proposed decision to produce and supply medical tools. This is contradictory and counterproductive to saving people’s lives by ensuring the access to medical tools they need," said the letter. It added that it was unacceptable that the text restricts the free movement and rapid distribution of needed medical products during a global pandemic by imposing a ban on re-exportation of COVID-19 vaccines produced under the decision. “This restriction cannot be justified," it said.
Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal during the meeting with co-sponsors of the patents waiver proposal on Tuesday had expressed disappointment at the way developed countries were trying to aggressively block the patents waiver deal. "The kind of fights over small commas, fullstops, one word here or there seem to suggest that this will continue through the five years if anybody was to try and take the benefit of this agreement... will get frustrated and not a single plant to manufacture vaccines will come with this..." said Goyal.
As per the current draft, patents waiver on covid-19 drugs and diagnostic kits has been left for countries to decide over the next six months, a move that risks more lives in the pandemic-hit developing world.
The six-month proposal comes in the latest negotiating text as a resolved issue, seen by Mint, which emerged after hectic talks on Monday at the 12th ministerial meeting in Geneva.
"This will be the beginning and in 6 months they we will decide over therapeutic and diagnostics.I am sorry to share with you that in some bilaterals that I have had with the developed world and some of the countries who are opposing this in a way, they have almost clearly hinted and indicated that Intellectual property rights are extremely important... we are flowing with wind only because of the international pressure but on diagnostics and therapeutics there is no way we are going to yield,"said Goyal.
(The writer is in Geneva at the invitation of the ministry of commerce and industry)