Thank you for the opportunity to speak. And for the latest draft of the pandemic agreement
shared with us on 26 March. In particular, we were pleased to see in the preamble the new
reference to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Protecting the rights of children
requires extra efforts, particularly in crises such as wars but also as a result of the loss of
financing for health.
We have not seen much progress on access to know-how and technology transfer. We
understand that this lack is due to some parties insisting on further tightening the conditions
under which technology transfer should take place. In particular, the demand that this is only
done ‘voluntarily’ in addition to ‘on mutually agreed terms’ is excessive and carries risks not
only to the chances of concluding this agreement but also to the other measures countries may
take consistent with their rights under international law.
Respect for intellectual property law includes respecting the flexibilities it contains to protect
the public interest.
We will offer more detailed comments later this week when Article 11 will be on the agenda. In
the meantime, we wish you wisdom and look forward to celebrating a finalised agreement with you on Friday.
All of our pandemic agreement resources are available here.
Kaitlin Mara, MSc, has been writing about international intellectual property and innovation policy for over 15 years.