Tens of world personalities today publicly called for it is guaranteed that an experience such as that of hoarding vaccines will not be repeated that there was during the covid pandemic and it is legally established that private economic interests cannot be above those of society.
In an appeal that they have issued coinciding with the three years since the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized that the world was facing its first pandemic in a hundred yearsthe leaders call on governments to establish in a future international treaty on pandemics that patent rights are suspended if a similar situation repeats itself.
This would make it possible to prioritize medical supplies -whether diagnostic tests, medicines, vaccines or others- to where they are most needed and not only to where there are resources to buy them.
An international treaty on pandemics is in full negotiation by the Member States of the WHO with the intention that it be approved in May 2024.
However, consultations between governments are difficult and for now there is no way to reconcile the positions of the countries that defend intellectual property rights above all else (through patents) and those that demand a less discriminatory approach. and more focused on the human being.
“Never again should the lives of people in rich countries be prioritized over the lives of people in the Global South (developing world). Never again should science developed with public money be blocked behind private monopolies,” the letter states.
It is signed by former presidents, former prime ministers, Nobel Prize winners, academics, diplomats, religious leaders and former heads of international organizations, including the President of East Timor, Jose Manuel Ramos-HortaNobel Peace Prize 1996, along with former leaders of more than 40 countries.
Former Secretary General of the United Nations ban ki moon he is also among the signatories, along with various directors and former directors of United Nations agencies.
The letter and the participation of all the signatory personalities was coordinated by People’s Vaccine Alliancea coalition of NGOs that works for equity in access to vaccines and other medical supplies.
The signatories of the open letter recall that at the height of the pandemic and when vaccines were becoming available, instead of distributing them based on need “pharmaceuticals sold them to rich countries”despite the fact that they had publicly promised not to seek benefits while the health emergency continued.
This is despite the fact that various governments, particularly in Europe and North America, heavily financed vaccine research by private laboratories.
Inequality in the distribution of vaccines prevented 1.3 million deaths from being averted (or one every 24 seconds) in the first year of the pandemic.
COVID was the direct cause of nearly 7 million deathsaccording to a scientific study published in 2022 in the journal Nature.
The letter also calls for governments to accept lift intellectual property barriers in the field of public health within the framework of the World Trade Organization (WTO), where last June the countries reached a minimum agreement that left civil society representatives unhappy.
This agreement only allowed the lifting of restrictions on exports of anti-COVID vaccines produced by a country as generics, skipping patents, but excluded tests and medicines (a demand of low-income countries).
In the case of these last two types of products, a six-month deadline was set to decide, but this expired last December and was extended without a defined date.
(With information from EFE)
Keep reading:
Three years of pandemic: 25 milestones that marked the world after the outbreak of COVID-19
The United States Congress advanced with the declassification of intelligence documents on the origin of COVID-19
The Spanish Flu pandemic: patients turned into specters who could not breathe and millions of deaths
Source-www.infobae.com