U.S. will back proposal to waive patent rights and boost Covid-19 vaccine production
In a significant move to combat the Covid-19 pandemic, the U.S. government agreed to support a controversial proposal to waive intellectual property rights for vaccines and increase global supplies of desperately needed doses.
The decision by the Biden administration comes after months of fruitless talks about the proposal before the World Trade Organization, where more than 100 low and middle-income countries pushed to find ways to expand and speed vaccine production. However, the proposal ran into stiff push back from wealthy countries, including the U.S., and the pharmaceutical industry, which argued intellectual property is not a barrier to greater access.
