Day April 10, 2021

The Temporary WTO Waiver to Fight COVID Must Include Copyright

[Sean Flynn] Over 250 organizations, prominent researchers, and experts support South Africa and India’s recent proposal to temporarily waive World Trade Organization (WTO) rules on intellectual property — including copyright — for the “prevention, containment and treatment of COVID-19.”... Most of the public debate on the proposal focuses on patent barriers to the production of generic versions of vaccines. Some commenters have proposed a way forward by dropping the non-patent issues. Research by the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP) helps demonstrate why the inclusion of copyright in the waiver is needed. One reason the existing TRIPS “flexibilities” for countries to issue compulsory licensing for patents is not adequate to scale up vaccine and treatment production around the world is that patents are not the only barrier. Access to industrial designs, undisclosed information and, yes, copyright is also often necessary.

Resolution supporting the TRIPS waiver proposal introduced in the Korean National Assembly

[Heesob Nam] Knowledge Commune, in collaboration with the Justice Party, successfully mobilized the members of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea to introduce this resolution... Recognizing that in this hyper connected global community COVID-19 pandemic can only be put an end by vaccination in every country, not in certain countries; Confirming that addressing of vaccine inequality is the key for ending COVID-19 pandemic; Recognizing that high income countries acquired two-thirds of the vaccine supply, accelerating vaccine inequality, and if this continues we have to wait until 2022 for herd immunity in low- and middle- income countries, which is estimated to produce an economic loss of UDS 9.2 trillion globally; Click here for more.