[GOAL] COVID IP waiver request: interesting but not entirely informed?

[Heather Morrison]

I note with interest the request from India and South Africa for a full waiver of IP rights with respect to anything relating to COVID:
https://docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages/SS/directdoc.aspx?filename=q:/IP/C/W669.pdf&Open=True

This sounds like the kind of initiative that OA enthusiasts might well have been involved in or support. The reason for this post is that I am hoping GOAL readers might have some background or perspective on this.  Also, I worry about OA enthusiasm and the strength of the OA movement distracting people in power from the most effective ways to address the pandemic, and in the medium to long term, the impact this could have on the OA movement per se.

Why do I characterize this as a distraction from effective COVID-19 action?

One example: in Canada, early action on vaccination was delayed because the country has little to no vaccine manufacturing capacity. (We have since caught up, through purchase because we are a rich country, and are among the most vaccinated country in the world). Full waivers on IP by every vaccine manufacturer in the world would not have made any difference to this situation. What will make a difference in future is the development of vaccine manufacturing capacity in Canada. This will happen, most notably a forthcoming factory by the maker of the Moderna vaccine. In this context, pushing the government to support full IP waiver rather obviously would not accomplish anything in the reasonably foreseeable future. If I were in government I would see things this way: big pharma is helpful - finding, manufacturing and distributing vaccines in a time frame that is unheard of, while IP waiver advocates seem like nice, well-meaning people who are not making much sense or offering viable short-term solutions.

My personal perspective is that all health care is a human right and should not be left to the corporate sector for profit-making. However, in a crisis the most important thing to do is to find and implement solutions. Fixing the economy can wait. Switching pharmaceutical development and distribution from a profit to a people centered basis is a laudable goal. This will probably take longer to accomplish than flipping scholarly communication production from the demand to the supply side for OA. The world should not have to wait decades for COVID relief.

The WHO letter mentions but does not request what I suggest is a more likely approach to avoiding IP interference with addressing the pandemic in the short term: compulsory licensing. This is a flexibility already permitted under TRIPS, as the World Trade Organization (WTO) explains here:
https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/public_health_faq_e.htm

My personal preference is to do away with "intellectual property" altogether. However, in the short term it makes more sense to advocate for full use of a flexibility that is already available rather than pushing for a major global policy change that, it should be obvious, would be a hard sell.

To get back to why I characterize this as a distraction: India & South Africa are asking for a policy change that is a hard sell when the policy per se is not likely to do very much to address the pandemic in the short term, and with respect to policy, there is an existing solution that would be a much easier sell (compulsory licensing)

Background or comments, anyone?


Dr. Heather Morrison

Associate Professor, School of Information Studies, University of Ottawa

Cross-appointed, Department of Communication

Professeur Agrégé, École des Sciences de l'Information, Université d'Ottawa

Principal Investigator, Sustaining the Knowledge Commons, a SSHRC Insight Project

sustainingknowledgecommons.org

Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca

https://uniweb.uottawa.ca/?lang=en#/members/706

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