Criticism of the international treaty against pandemics for its lack of ambition

Negotiations for an international agreement against future pandemics are accelerating but some participants fear that it is not very ambitious to fight the inequalities in access to medicines, revealed by the covid-19.

That pandemic revealed the failures of the global health system, and the 194 member countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) decided to negotiate a legally binding text to deal with the next catastrophe, or even prevent it.

At the closing ceremony of the WHO’s annual assembly Tuesday in Geneva, its director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, urged countries to “negotiate a solid deal.”

“We are the generation that lived through the covid-19 pandemic, so we must be the generation (…) that brings changes to guarantee the safety of future generations”, said. The process, which is just in its infancy, has the ambitious goal of reaching a final agreement by May 2024.

But critics are already warning that the revisions to the basic document of the negotiations are weakening their scope, especially regarding access to vaccines and other medical products.

It is about a gap between rich and poor countries that cost countless lives during the pandemic due to lack of access to vaccines or even medical oxygen.

“I think it’s a real throwback”Suerie Moon, co-director of the Global Health Center at the University Institute of Geneva, told AFP.

If the poorest countries do not see solid guarantees that they will be better protected in the next pandemic, “I think there is a real risk that they will withdraw” of the talks, he warned.

The revised text presented last week by the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB), in charge of conducting the negotiating process, is a synthesis of a multitude of proposals from numerous member countries. It identifies areas where consensus is emerging and proposes various options on the most controversial issues.

It can be better

For some observers, this project, which will be examined in the next round of INB debates in mid-June, is “cleaner” but also weaker in some important points.

Some NGOs especially deplore the removal of a mention that obliges private companies that receive public funds for their research and development to be transparent in their pricing and transfer their technology to the poorest countries.

Instead, the draft in its current version calls on countries to strive to promote the sharing of know-how and transparency “in accordance with national law and as appropriate”.

“Voluntary measures are insufficient,” said Luis Villarroel of the NGO Innovarte, which works to promote a balanced intellectual property system. The text is “very weak”he claimed.

Mohga Kamal-Yanni of the People’s Vaccine Alliance, which combats inequalities in access to vaccines, also found the text “weak” on the practical modalities of ensuring equitable access.

“Covid-19, and HIV before it, clearly showed that we cannot depend on the goodwill of pharmaceutical companies to ensure equitable access,” highlighted the activist in a statement.

Urgency

There are also elements in the text that probably do not suit the pharmaceutical industry, but are important in the eyes of less wealthy countries, such as the idea of ​​linking the sharing of genetic resources for research purposes to the obligation to share the fruits in form of royalties, technology transfer or the medicines themselves.

This concept of a better sharing of genetic resources appears, for example, in the recent UN treaty on the high seas.

The International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Associations (IFPMA) fears that such an obligation could curb data sharing.

“We remain concerned that decisions will be made that we will end up regretting in the event of a future pandemic”declared the head of IFPMA, Thomas Cueni.

Source: AFP