Page 4 - Mid Valley Times 6-2-22 E-Edition

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Guest Column
A threat to global innovation at the WTO
By James Pooley
Guest columnist
The World Trade Organization recently announced that the United States, European Union, India, and South Africa had finalized a proposal to waive intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines. Soon, all 164 WTO member nations will vote on whether to imple- ment the proposed waiver.
The terms it outlines would be revolutionary — that is, in undermining the rules for intellectual property protection.
The bedrock of this system is the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, known as the TRIPgreement -- which since 1995 has es- tablished explicit minimum standards WTO members must meet in respecting one another's patents, trade secrets, trademarks, and copyrights.
All 164 WTO members have adopted the TRIPS Agreement.
Yet some nations in the developing world have long bristled at TRIPS and sought to modify it. This has es- pecially been true in the case of medicines. The TRIPS negotiations were ongoing at the time of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and many poor countries were understandably worried that they would have no affordable access to treatments as they developed.
But the TRIPS Agreement includes a provision that addresses this concern. When a country is facing an "extreme urgency" — say, a public health crisis — and is unable to secure the medicine it needs or negotiate a voluntary license with a patent holder, it can issue a "compulsory license" to authorize local manufacturers to produce the needed medicine for its own population. But this safety valve does not invalidate the ownership of the patent-holder — thus preserving the core of IP protection.
When the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in 2020, how- ever, new anxieties arose about the access of developing countries to the vaccines. India and South Africa then proposed a radical departure from the TRIPS framework at the WTO. They sought a waiver of global IP commit- ments on all health products and technologies related to the prevention, treatment, or containment of Covid-19.
It was telling that the leaders here were India and South Africa, two hubs of global generic drug manu- facturing, and that their request was so broad. Rather than simply responding to the public health emergency at hand, they saw an opportunity to set a precedent for burying TRIPS in the future and acquiring not only pat- ents but also private-sector trade secrets.
In short, it was naked commercial interest directed at piracy of medical innovation, dressed up as public health concerns.
It's noteworthy that two years after India and South Africa put their proposal forward, it's become a "solu- tion" in search of a problem. The Serum Institute of India, the world's largest vaccine manufacturer, has stopped producing COVID-19 vaccines because demand is plummeting amid mounting global supplies. The Af- rica Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, mean- while, has asked that countries halt all vaccine donations to Africa because "the primary challenge for vaccinating the continent is no longer supply shortages but logistics challenges and vaccine hesitancy." Indeed, by the end of 2022, the world's cumulative production of COVID vaccines may reach 30 billion doses —or about four for every human on the planet.
Overcoming hesitancy and distributing doses re- mains a challenge — but not one that would be budged an inch by a TRIPS waiver. It's time for the Biden ad- ministration to rethink its support for the idea and rein in its WTO negotiators.
James Pooley is former Deputy Director General of the United Nations' World Intellectual Property Orga- nization and a member of the Center for Intellectual Property Understanding. This piece originally ran in the Boston Herald.
Large Memorial Day turnouts cap off busy week in communities
Fred Hall — Publisher Emeritus Jon Earnest — Editor
Dick Sheppard — Editor Emeritus
Thursday, June 2, 2022 | A4 | Mid Valley TiMes Editorial & Opinions
QUOTE
“Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.”
— Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968), Strength to Love, 1963
The past week again was an extremely busy one for any people in Dinuba and Reedley, as both cities graduated large high school classes and then followed up with Memorial Day commemoration ceremonies taking place on the its longtime traditional May 30 date.
In 2021, the holiday re- turned to the tail end of the month. And in that case, that meant that graduation ceremo- nies in those two cities were being held before Memorial Day, instead of afterwards in recent years. That trend con- tinued this year, meaning that both Reedley and Dinuba se- nior students were finished with their high school careers by the time the three-day holi- day arrived.
With graduations happen- ing right before the long week- end, it probably meant many families were sticking around the area. Not having school did affect the Memorial Day ceremony at Smith Mountain Cemetery in Dinuba, as the Di- nuba High band wasn't avail- able to perform as it had been at the Veterans Day event last November. But a small band
was in attendance to offer some musical offerings.
Still, the ceremony drew good attendance, including a share of young people. Both Smith Mountain Cemetery and Reedley Cemetery were awash with American flags, and small white crosses adorned veter- ans gravesites in Reedley. The return of full live ceremonies (this is the second one in Reed- ley since COVID restrictions have eased) was evident in the large turnouts. A group of at- tendees filled the shaded area northeast of Smith Mountain's main chapel, and many people flanked the shaded and sunny areas behind.
Imadealaterunuptothe tail end of the ceremony at Sanger Cemetery, and many people were in attendance there as well. The military at- tendance these days is domi- nated by the Vietnam veter- ans, and the public continues to offer a good amount of sup- port. It's important that these beautiful, solemn ceremonies honoring all our military dead continue and thrive. Once again, our three cities came through in a big way.
•••
As May
turns into June,
the dream con-
tinues for the
Orange Cove
High softball
team. The Ti-
tans' magical
season continued last week with the Central Section Di- vision IV championship at Fresno State on May 28. A 10- 0 dismantling of Mission Prep moved the top-seeded girls into the Southern California Regional playoffs.
The run didn't subside in the least on May 31, as Orange Cove blasted Legacy High of South Gate by the same 10-0 mercy rule score. That means the Ti- tans play host to the regional semifinals on Thursday, June 2, at OCHS field. A win there, and it's very likely Orange Cove travels to Porterville to play top seed Monache High for the So- Cal Championship.
The Titans are the region's lone remaining high school sports team in action. Come out and support the young women!
Jon Earnest is news-sports editor for The Times.
Jon Earnest
To vaccinate all, don't attack the current system
By Howard Dean
Guest columnist
More than 11 billion COV- ID-19 shots have been admin- istered worldwide, the biggest vaccination campaign in histo- ry. More than five billion peo- ple — 66 percent of the global population -— have received at least one dose.
Yet despite this extraordi- nary achievement, there remains work to be done. Global vaccina- tion rates are uneven. While a couple dozen countries have fully inoculated more than 80 percent of their people, others lag.
We need to close that gap, both as a humanitarian concern and because inequity threatens our collective health, straining global health systems. Unfor- tunately, in their haste to find solutions, some governments are pursuing strategies that will do more harm than good. Even worse, one of those gov- ernments is our own.
Reportedly, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative just embraced a draft agreement with the European Union, In- dia, and South Africa to waive commitment to protect intellec- tual property rights on Covid-19 vaccines. The deal would allow companies in developing coun- tries to copy vaccine formulas and processes without the pat-
ent holder's consent, flouting longstanding global trade rules. If approved, this deal would distract from the real challeng- es facing the global vaccination campaign, and harm our future ability to fight disease — includ-
ing the next pandemic. Proponents of the IP waiver
seem to still believe that vaccine inequity is being caused by in- adequate supply. That may have been a legitimate fear early in the pandemic, before we knew how vaccine development and manufacturing would pan out.
But now we know that sup- ply isn't a problem. Drugmak- ers have the capacity to pro- duce more than 20 billion vac- cine doses this year — more than enough to inoculate every person on the planet.
Today, manufacturers are being asked to hold off on de- livery of new doses.
The real challenges to vac- cinating the world against Co- vid-19 are two-fold.
First, vaccine hesitancy is a problem worldwide, just as it has been in the United States. Sometimes it's due to skepticism or misinformation about safety and effectiveness, and at other times, a dearth of time and ener- gy amid busy, challenging lives.
Second, infrastructure and logistics problems have plagued many vaccination cam-
paigns. Depending on the loca- tion, these may include a lack of transportation, refrigerated storage, reliable electricity, or health care staff.
Addressing these knotty problems will require sig- nificant investments in public health infrastructure as well as outreach campaigns.
Stripping IP protections from drug developers threatens the medical innovation pipeline that brought us several safe, highly effective COVID-19 vaccines in less than a year. Patent rights grant inventors a set period of time during which they have the exclusive right to make and sell their creations. That keeps investment flowing and the inno- vations coming across all tech- based sectors of the economy. Without legal protections, that investment will dry up, and we'll lose out on the treatments and vaccines of tomorrow.
We've made remarkable progress in our efforts to vac- cinate the world. But to end the pandemic, we must focus on objectives that will have a meaningful impact on vaccine inequity. Waiving IP rights will only distract us from closing the global vaccine gap.
Howard Dean is the former Chair of the Democratic Na- tional Committee and former Governor of Vermont.