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Proactively ensuring access to essential medical solutions: Lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic
Helen Yu
Intellectual Property Rights in Times of Crisis, Pages: 83 - 103
Swansea University Author: Helen Yu
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DOI (Published version): 10.4337/9781035323579.00009
Abstract
Over three years after the global outbreak of a coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), the World Health Organization has finally declared that “COVID-19 is no longer a public health emergency of international concern”. However, based on the recent past negotiations of the World Trade Organization leading...
| Published in: | Intellectual Property Rights in Times of Crisis |
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| ISBN: | 9781035323562 9781035323579 |
| Published: |
Edward Elgar Publishing
2024
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| URI: | https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa70609 |
| Abstract: |
Over three years after the global outbreak of a coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19), the World Health Organization has finally declared that “COVID-19 is no longer a public health emergency of international concern”. However, based on the recent past negotiations of the World Trade Organization leading up to the temporary waiver of intellectual property (IP) rights on COVID-19-related health innovations, the likelihood of achieving an effective and agreeable structure to remove IP barriers through negotiating a broader IP waiver or expansion of the compulsory licensing framework, or through concluding a meaningful pandemics preparedness treaty, is rather slim. A more pragmatic approach to ensure that outcomes of publicly funded efforts can ultimately reach the intended public is to incorporate legally supported access and production conditions into publicly funded initiatives designed to drive rapid development of innovative solutions and accelerate regulatory approval. Informed by policy objectives such as principles of “responsible research and innovation” and “global public good,” worldwide supplies to medical solutions that benefited from public funds and publicly funded initiatives cannot be frustrated. This chapter will examine how the issue of IP rights was dealt with in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, why the current solutions are still problematic, and conclude with legally supported recommendations that can be adopted in the future to mitigate against the access and availability problems society continues to face. |
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| Keywords: |
Return of benefit to society; Responsible research and sustainable innovation; Health policy; Pandemic preparedness; Legally supported framework for access and availability to medical solutions; Conditional access to publicly funded initiatives |
| College: |
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Start Page: |
83 |
| End Page: |
103 |