Coronavirus: WHO appeals to Chinese pharmaceutical firms to share vaccine patents
- WHO is looking to China and India to share patents to help boost Covid-19 jabs in developing countries
- As the world grapples with the emerging Omicron strain, China’s president pledges to supply a further 1 billion vaccine doses to Africa next year
But so far it has had the cold shoulder from pharmaceutical giants – including Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca – even though it has set up a mRNA technology transfer hub in Africa, expecting that would ease the sharing of advanced vaccine technology.
While still optimistic that Western pharmaceutical firms will share their technology, the WHO is also looking to China and India to try to tap into their vaccine technologies.
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“In the case of China, we are in touch with the two big companies that have the vaccines approved by the World Health Organization,” Erika Dueñas Loayza, head of the intellectual property unit in the WHO division for access to medicines and health products, said.