The Biden administration is throwing its support behind efforts to waive intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines in an effort to speed the end of the pandemic. United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai announced the government’s position in a Wednesday statement, amid World Trade Organization talks over easing global trade rules to enable more countries to produce more of the life-saving vaccines. “The Administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines,” Tai said in the statement. But she cautioned that it would take time to reach the required global “consensus” to waive the protections under WTO rules, and U.S. officials said it would not have an immediate effect on the global supply of COVID-19 shots. “This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,” said Tai. “The Administration’s aim is to get as many safe and effective vaccines to as many people as fast as possible.” Also read: PVA bats for suspension of intellectual property rights on Covid jabs Tai’s announcement comes hours after WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala spoke to a closed-door meeting of ambassadors from developing and developed countries that have been wrangling over the issue, but agree on the need for wider access to COVID-19 treatments, WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell said. The WTO’s General Council — made up of ambassadors — was taking up the pivotal issue of a temporary waiver for intellectual property protections on COVID-19 vaccines and other tools, which South Africa and India first proposed in October. The idea has gained support in the developing world and among some progressive lawmakers in the West. Rockwell said a WTO panel on intellectual property was set to take up the waiver proposal again at a “tentative” meeting later this month, before a formal meeting June 8-9. No consensus -- which is required under WTO rules -- was expected to emerge from the ambassadors’ two-day meeting Wednesday and Thursday. But Rockwell pointed to a change in tone after months of wrangling. Also read: Senators to Biden: Waive vaccine intellectual property rules “I would say that the discussion was far more constructive, pragmatic. It was less emotive and less finger pointing than it had been in the past,” Rockwell said, citing a surge in cases in places like India. “I think that this feeling of everyone-being-in-it-together was being expressed in a way that I had not heard to this point.” Authors of the proposal, which has faced resistance from many countries with influential pharmaceutical and biotech industries, have been revising it in hopes of making it more palatable. Okonjo-Iweala, in remarks posted on the WTO website, said it was “incumbent on us to move quickly to put the revised text on the table, but also to begin and undertake text-based negotiations.” “I am firmly convinced that once we can sit down with an actual text in front of us, we shall find a pragmatic way forward,” that is “acceptable to all sides,” she said. Co-sponsors of the idea were shuttling between different diplomatic missions to make their case, according to a Geneva trade official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. A deadlock persists, and opposing sides remain far apart, the official said. Also read: Covid-19 vaccines: Ex-leaders, Nobel laureates urge Biden to waive intellectual property rules The argument, part of a long-running debate about intellectual property protections, centers on lifting patents, copyrights and protections for industrial design and confidential information to help expand the production and deployment of vaccines during supply shortages. The aim is to suspend the rules for several years, just long enough to beat down the pandemic. The issue has become more pressing with a surge in cases in India, the world’s second-most populous country and a key producer of vaccines — including one for COVID-19 that relies on technology from Oxford University and British-Swedish pharmaceutical maker AstraZeneca. Proponents, including WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, note that such waivers are part of the WTO toolbox and insist there’s no better time to use them than during the once-in-a-century pandemic that has taken 3.2 million lives, infected more than 437 million people and devastated economies. More than 100 countries have come out in support of the proposal, and a group of 110 members of Congress — all fellow Democrats of Biden — sent him a letter last month that called on him to support the waiver. Opponents say a waiver would be no panacea. They insist that production of coronavirus vaccines is complex and simply can’t be ramped up by easing intellectual property, and say lifting protections could hurt future innovation.

Ten liberal senators are urging President Joe Biden to back India and South Africa’s appeal to the World Trade Organization to temporarily relax intellectual property rules so coronavirus vaccines can be manufactured by nations that are struggling to inoculate their populations. The lawmakers, in a letter delivered to the White House on Thursday evening, wrote that Biden should “prioritize people over pharmaceutical company profits” and support the temporary waiver of the rules. A waiver could pave the way for generic or other manufacturers to make more vaccines. The letter was led by independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, along with Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Sherrod Brown of Ohio. Democratic Sens. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Edward Markey of Massachusetts, Jeff Merkley of Oregon, Chris Van Hollen of Maryland and Raphael Warnock of Georgia also signed the letter. “Simply put, we must make vaccines, testing, and treatments accessible everywhere if we are going to crush the virus anywhere,” the lawmakers say in the letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press. Also read: Covid-19 vaccines: Ex-leaders, Nobel laureates urge Biden to waive intellectual property rules More than 100 nations support a temporary waiver, which could help vaccine manufacturing ramp up in poorer countries that are struggling to acquire vaccine supplies. The Biden administration has said it is studying the issue. Opponents, including pharmaceutical companies, worry that it would set dangerous precedent in allowing scientists around the globe to copy American and European companies’ research — some of which was funded by the U.S. government — long before patents expire. The Trump administration had opposed calls for the waiver. The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the lawmakers’ letter. The lawmakers’ appeal to Biden came after a group of 170 former world leaders and Nobel laureates earlier this week sent a similar letter to Biden urging him to support a temporary waiver of the WTO’s intellectual property rules. The coronavirus pandemic has killed nearly 3 million people worldwide, including more than 170,000 in India and more than 50,000 in South Africa, according to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

More than 60 former world leaders and over 100 Nobel Prize winners Thursday called on US President Joe Biden to support a waiver of intellectual property rules for Covid-19 vaccines. A waiver would boost vaccine manufacturing and speed up the response to the pandemic in the US and around the world, they said in a joint letter to Biden. The letter specifically asks Biden to support a proposal from South African and India at the World Trade Organization (WTO) to temporarily waive intellectual property rules related to Covid-19 vaccines and treatments. It calculates that at the current pace of vaccine production, the poorest nations will be left waiting until at least 2024 to achieve mass Covid-19 immunisation. The signatories to the letter include former British prime minister Gordon Brown, former president of Colombia Juan Manuel Santos, former president of France François Hollande and Nobel laureates Professor Joseph Stiglitz, Professor Muhammad Yunus and Professor Francoise Barre-Sinoussi. Also read: Funding for vaccine procurement earmarked in deals with WB, ADB: Dr Meerjady Gordon Brown said, "President Biden has said no one is safe until everyone is safe, and now with the G7 ahead there is an unparalleled opportunity to provide the leadership that only the US can provide and that hastens an end to the pandemic for the world." The former British prime minister also said an urgent temporary waiver of intellectual property rules at the WTO would help them ramp up the global supply of vaccines together with a global multi-year burden-sharing plan to finance vaccines for the poorest countries. Professor Yunus said, "Big pharmaceutical companies are setting the terms of the end of today's pandemic, and the cost of allowing senseless monopolies is only more death and more people being pushed into poverty." "We together urge President Biden to stand on the right side of history and ensure a vaccine is a global common good, free of intellectual property protection." François Hollande said the extreme inequality in access to vaccines around the world has created an unbearable political and moral situation. "If the US supports the lifting of patents, Europe will have to take on its responsibilities. In the face of this devastating pandemic, world leaders must prioritise the public interest and international solidarity." Also read: South Asian Govts must ensure equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines: AI The leaders also called for the intellectual property waiver to be accompanied by the open sharing of vaccine know-how and technology, and by coordinated and strategic global investment in research, development, and manufacturing capacity, especially in developing countries. The resulting vaccine inequality, the leaders warned, means that the US economy already risks losing $1.3 trillion in GDP this year, and if the virus is left to roam the world, the increased risk of new viral variants means even vaccinated people in the US could be unprotected once more. The letter, which was coordinated by the People's Vaccine Alliance, a coalition of more than 50 organisations, warned that at the current global immunisation rate, it was likely that only 10% of people in the majority of poor countries will be vaccinated in the next year. Françoise Barré-Sinoussi said, "We will not end today's global pandemic until rich countries – most especially the US – stop blocking the ability of countries around the world to mass-produce safe and effective vaccines." Joseph Stiglitz said, "New mutations of the virus will continue to cost lives and upend our interconnected global economy until everyone, everywhere has access to a safe and effective vaccine. Intellectual property is the utmost artificial barrier to global vaccine supply."