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Vaccine Patents, Global Equity And How To Vaccinate The World

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Health worker prepares doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford COVID-19 vaccine on the first day of vaccination campaign, in Rabat, Morocco. As the coronavirus pandemic exploded worldwide last April, global organizations banded together to help ensure vaccines would be distributed fairly. (Mosa'ab Elshamy, File/AP Photo)
Health worker prepares doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford COVID-19 vaccine on the first day of vaccination campaign, in Rabat, Morocco. As the coronavirus pandemic exploded worldwide last April, global organizations banded together to help ensure vaccines would be distributed fairly. (Mosa'ab Elshamy, File/AP Photo)

Rich and middle-income countries have received nearly all of the available COVID-19 vaccines so far. Now there’s a push for pharmaceutical companies to waive vaccine patents so poorer countries can make their own. The fight over intellectual property, and how to vaccinate the world.

Guests

Madhavi Sunder, associate dean for international and graduate programs and law professor at Georgetown University Law Center. (@MadhaviSunder)

Rachel Silverman, policy fellow at the Center for Global Development. (@rsilv_dc)

Anne McDonald Pritchett, senior vice president of policy and research at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.

Also Featured

Abdul Muktadir, chairman and managing director at Incepta Pharmaceuticals.

From The Reading List

Washington Post: "Opinion: Opinion: Poor countries may not be vaccinated until 2024. Here’s how to prevent that." — "President Biden announced last week that the United States will have enough vaccines for every American adult by the end of May. Other rich nations will soon follow suit, having purchased enough doses to inoculate their populations many times over."

Euronews: "Rich countries must stop ‘vaccine apartheid’" — "Each passing day underscores the urgency of expanding Covid-19 vaccine access. The gulf between vaccine haves and have-nots has been denounced as 'vaccine apartheid.'"

Washington Post: "Waiving vaccine patents won’t help inoculate poorer nations" — "The coronavirus vaccine rollout in the United States is quickly ramping up: The Biden administration now promises enough vaccine supply to inoculate every American adult by the end of May."

Associated Press: "Years of research laid groundwork for speedy COVID-19 vaccines" — "How could scientists race out COVID-19 vaccines so fast without cutting corners? A head start helped — over a decade of behind-the-scenes research that had new vaccine technology poised for a challenge just as the coronavirus erupted."

Quartz: "Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine is set to be one of the most lucrative drugs in the world" — "Pfizer expects to sell $15 billion worth of Covid-19 vaccines in 2021. That would make it the second-highest revenue-generating drug anytime, anywhere, according to industry reports."

New York Times: "Rich Countries Signed Away a Chance to Vaccinate the World" — "In the coming days, a patent will finally be issued on a five-year-old invention, a feat of molecular engineering that is at the heart of at least five major Covid-19 vaccines. And the United States government will control that patent."

Foreign Affairs: "America Can—and Should—Vaccinate the World" — "After a virtual “Quad summit” last Friday, the leaders of the United States, India, Japan, and Australia announced that they would cooperate to deliver one billion vaccine doses in the Indo-Pacific, directly countering China’s lead in distributing vaccines to the region."

This program aired on March 24, 2021.

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