Pope Francis has extended support for waiving intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccines ahead of the 12th World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial conference, and called on the UN body to adopt measures to ensure that everyone has access to the virus vaccines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the Covid-19 pandemic has devastating effects around the globe, health experts have called for the use of Covid-19 vaccines to be a universal common good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Furthermore, hundreds of civil society organizations around the world have called for the TRIPS waiver to be supported, a measure that would expand access to lifesaving vaccines and other health products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A temporary waiver of certain intellectual property rules under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement) has been opposed by the EU at the WTO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pope Francis said in a tweet, “I join the Pan-American and Pan-African Committees of Judges for Social Rights in calling on the WTO to adopt measures to ensure accessible Covid-19 vaccines for all, especially for the people of Africa.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Equitable access to safe and effective vaccines is fundamental to saving lives and livelihoods. Africa cannot be left behind. No one is safe until everyone is safe,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
WTO negotiators in Geneva finalized two draft texts on the pandemic response, including the intellectual property response, ahead of the WTO meeting on June 12.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those two texts will now be sent to trade ministers attending the 12th Ministerial Conference of the organization for review and possible approval.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the upcoming WTO ministerial begins on June 12, India is hoping for a positive outcome regarding the TRIPS waiver. The conference will be attended by Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
India and South Africa submitted a proposal to the WTO TRIPS Council in October 2020 asking for a waiver from certain provisions of the TRIPS Agreement for the prevention, treatment, and containment of COVID-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is proposed to temporarily waive certain provisions of the TRIPS Agreement to the extent that they impede access to the COVID-19 products and technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pope Francis has extended support for waiving intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccines ahead of the 12th World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial conference, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":86833,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[32,33,310],"class_list":["post-86832","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news","tag-corona","tag-covid","tag-wto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86832","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86832"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86832\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86834,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86832\/revisions\/86834"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dailypunjabtimes.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}