Copyright COVID-19 vaccine, not easy

The removal of copyright for the COVID-19 vaccine is not easy, although the US is a proponent and advocate.
Recently, the news agency Reuters said President Joe Biden has voiced support for giving up intellectual property rights with some COVID-19 vaccines, thereby helping countries around the world, especially developing countries, increase production. and speed up the vaccination process. The decision immediately acclaimed by medical researchers is a significant step forward in an effort to equalize global vaccine distribution.

According to the news agency DW The final decision on whether or not to give up the copyright for the COVID-19 vaccine will be decided by the 164-member World Trade Organization (WTO). Of these, more than 100 countries have supported negotiations towards the abolition of measures to protect intellectual property rights with the COVID-19 vaccine. However, as long as a country disagrees, the WTO cannot approve this proposal. However, there are still countries that oppose the US move. Press conference on this issue on May 6, a spokesman for the German government warned that this would make pharmaceutical companies and biotech companies lose motivation to research and develop vaccines, negatively impacting. the entire vaccine industry in general. Therefore “the protection of intellectual property is a resource for creativity and must be maintained in the future”. The waiver of the vaccine license does not help much in the goal of increasing world vaccination coverage. The reason, “the factors that limit the number of vaccines vaccinated are production capacity and quality standards, not the copyright story”. Protect effort and gi Oh degree ng l Ugh c research According to radio CNN In the current context, giving up intellectual property rights with vaccines is a very complicated problem. A vaccine that has been successfully researched and developed is a collection of a series of different ingredients and materials and each ingredient and ingredient is copyrighted by at least one company or researcher. wisdom. For example, inside the vaccine company Pfizer (USA) and Biotechnology Company BioNTech (Germany) produces 280 ingredients and materials are licensed from many parties from 19 countries. Once a waiver scenario occurs, anyone can freely access and use the ingredients and ingredients in this vaccine – causing significant damage to Pfizer, BioNTech and others. holding the copyrights of those ingredients and materials. Medical staff in the capital Berlin (Germany) prepare the vials of vaccines to be vaccinated in April. Photo: DW “A single dose of vaccine contains all intellectual property from licensing agreements, copyrights, industrial designs to trade secret protection laws, patent secrets. If the copyright for the COVID-19 vaccine is abandoned, how can this be enforced? ” – Intellectual property rights expert Achal Prabhala of the Shuttleworth Foundation (South Africa) analyzed. Mr. Prabhala also affirmed that intellectual copyright is the backbone of the entire pharmaceutical and medical industry because it is difficult and time-consuming to research and create a product that is safe to use in humans. The recognition and protection of copyright is a way of respecting the efforts of researchers. The risk of technology secrets disclosure Another equally important issue when it comes to vaccine licensing issues is the protection of vaccine technology and formulation. Currently, Pfizer, BioNTech and Moderna (USA) are the pharmaceutical companies and technology companies leading the use of new generation mRNA technology to significantly increase the effectiveness of vaccines. This technology is also evaluated to be highly applicable not only in the prevention of COVID-19 but also in other diseases in the future. Meanwhile, pharmaceutical companies in Russia or China have not fully applied this technology; Vaccines that these countries produce and put into use do not have mRNA technology, so the effectiveness level is also somewhat not as high. “Pfizer and Moderna took years of research to develop these vaccines. China and Russia and other countries both want to access it. Their goal is to possess the underlying technology to make vaccines not only to prevent COVID-19 but also for other diseases, ”said former US Ambassador to China Gary Locke. Reuters . In the event that the vaccine rights are abandoned, Beijing will likely force the above-mentioned pharmaceutical firms to hand over the technology if they want to operate in the Chinese market. On the other hand, Beijing may also ask other companies to generate income for such information without fear of being criticized for stealing foreign company secrets. If pharmaceutical companies refuse to provide information, they will face many legal consequences. Remember, intellectual property rights have been a big question between the US and China for many years now, and has been one of the main reasons for the outbreak of the US-China trade war in 2018. • EU completed a contract to buy 1.8 billion vaccine money Associated Reuters May 10 quoted Mr. Thierry Breton – Commissioner in charge of industry and domestic markets the European Union (EU) said that this bloc will not continue to buy vaccine COVID-19 by the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca (UK-Switzerland). Swedish) production. The reason AstraZeneca has not met its commitment to supply vaccines to the EU. By the end of the first quarter of 2021, the EU received only 67 million doses of vaccine from AstraZeneca, although the initial target was 300 million doses. It is expected that in the second quarter, the EU will receive an additional 250 million doses. The remaining 280 million doses will be delivered to the EU by AstraZeneca during the last six months of 2021. In addition to legal disputes with the EU, AstraZeneca’s vaccine reputation has also deteriorated due to information related to adverse reactions. Some European countries such as Denmark have stopped using AstraZeneca’s vaccine, while in most other countries in the region, this vaccine is only used for people over 55 years old. After discontinuing the contract with AstraZeneca, the EU plans to order more vaccines using mRNA technology such as Pfizer / BioNTech or Moderna. In fact, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said over the weekend that the EU has officially completed a contract to buy up to 1.8 billion doses of Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine over the next two years.