Coronavirus world updates: Germany reacts to Joe Biden’s vaccine waiver plan
Angela Merkel has challenged Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin’s waiver on patent protections for COVID-19 vaccines as cases surge in Egypt and Argentina.
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Germany does not support the United States’ call to introduce a patent waiver to COVID-19 vaccines, despite growing support from other global nations.
The German government say a waiver could lead to future limitations on the private research sector and have a negative long-term effect.
“The US suggestion for the lifting of patent protection for COVID-19 vaccines has significant implications for vaccine production as a whole,” a German government spokeswoman said.
“The limiting factors in the production of vaccines are the production capacities and the high-quality standards and not patents,” they said. “The protection of intellectual property is a source of innovation and must remain so in the future.”
Hours earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his support for the waiver, which will be discussed at the World Trade Organisation. Any decision to introduce such a waiver, however, will require a consensus, meaning Germany’s opposition could seriously damage the plan.
US President Joe Biden announced his support for a waiver on Wednesday, saying it would help to democratise vaccine rollouts across poorer nations, and increase the speed of global economic recoveries.
Currently in Europe for G7 meetings, US Secretary of State Tony Blinken told MSNBC that current projections show the world will not reach mass vaccination until 2024.
“We can speed this up and get that done, I think, in a much shorter time. And if we do, we’re all going to be better off,” Mr Blinken said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday (local time) said he supported the idea of a waiver on patent protections for coronavirus vaccines as Russia registered its fourth virus jab called Sputnik Light.
A campaign to lift patent protections on COVID-19 vaccines picked up steam on Thursday, with French, German and EU leadership saying they were ready to discuss a proposal by US President Joe Biden, before Mr Putin added his support.
“We are hearing from Europe an idea that, in my opinion, deserves attention — namely, to remove patent protections from vaccines against COVID-19 altogether,” Mr Putin said during a televised meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova.
“Russia would of course support such an approach,” Mr Putin said, urging Ms Golikova to work out the logistics.
“As I have said many times … We should not think about how to extract maximum profit, but about how to ensure people’s safety.”
Supporters of waivers for vaccines argue that poor countries are struggling to get inoculation drives underway while rich countries protect the intellectual property rights of pharmaceutical giants.
Russia has registered three coronavirus vaccines, and on Thursday approved a fourth — a single-dose version of its Sputnik V jab called Sputnik Light.
Mr Putin’s approval came as international support grew on Thursday (local time) for the proposal as India posted record deaths and infections from a catastrophic wave swamping the country.
Rich nations have faced accusations of hoarding shots while poor countries struggle to get inoculation programs off the ground, with the virus surging across the developing world in contrast to the easing of restrictions in Europe and the United States.
Under intense pressure to ease protections for vaccine manufacturers, Washington’s Trade Representative Katherine Tai said the country “supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines”.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the announcement was “a monumental moment in the fight against COVID-19”.
The African Union’s health watchdog also praised it as a “remarkable expression of leadership”.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen recently voiced reluctance to waive patents, but said on Thursday (local time) that Brussels was ready to discuss the proposal, a stance echoed by European economic powerhouse Germany.
But there was far more enthusiasm from other national capitals including Paris, Rome and Vienna.
“This pandemic has taught us that we can only win together,” said Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza.
BAD NEWS FOR BIG PHARMA
However the move is opposed by a consortium of big pharmaceutical companies, which described the decision as “disappointing” and warned it could hamper innovation.
Shares in Asia-listed vaccine makers — including Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical, CanSino Biologics and JCR Pharmaceutical sinking — tumbled Thursday (local time) after the US announcement.
Supporters of the waiver say that easing patent restrictions will spur production of low-cost generic vaccines, helping poor countries that are struggling to immunise their people.
Opponents argue the move will damage intellectual property rights and erode the profit incentive, ultimately affecting pharmaceutical research and development.
German firm BioNTech said patent protection was not holding back production or supply of COVID vaccines and that scrapping them would not lead to an increase in jabs in the short and medium term.
India has been leading the fight to allow more drugmakers to manufacture the vaccines, as it faces a surge that has seen patients die in streets outside hospitals due to bed and medical oxygen shortages.
The country reported almost 4,000 COVID-19 deaths and more than 412,000 infections on Thursday — both new records — dashing hopes that the catastrophic recent surge may have been easing following several days of falling case numbers.
A top Indian official had warned earlier this week that the worst could still be to come, describing a third wave as “inevitable given the high levels of circulating virus” and saying the country badly needs more oxygen from other countries.
“We should prepare for new waves,” said K. Vijay Raghavan, the Indian government’s principal scientific adviser.
Around 230 million Indians fell into poverty due to the pandemic last year with young people and women the hardest hit, and the current second wave threatens to make matters even worse, according to a new study.
GLOBAL SURGE
Also seeing rising coronavirus cases is Egypt, which announced a partial shutdown of malls and restaurants and called off festivities for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr to curb the spread.
The country has now recorded nearly 232,000 cases including more than 13,000 deaths, with Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli saying it was in a “third wave”.
Eid celebrations are also facing disruption in Muslim-majority Malaysia, where new rules in the capital Kuala Lumpur will see only essential businesses allowed to operate and restaurant dining-in banned after daily cases topped 3,000 in recent days.
Joining India in breaking records for COVID-19 deaths this week was Argentina, which recorded 633 deaths in 24 hours on Wednesday despite stepped-up measures to reduce the movement of people across the country.
As Europe gears up for the summer holiday season, Israel was added to an EU safe list for countries whose nationals can freely travel to the continent.
And in the sports world, there was hope for the Olympic Games in Tokyo as Pfizer/BioNTech said they would supply vaccines for athletes.
The pandemic has killed over 3.2 million people worldwide since the virus first emerged in late 2019, according to official data.
The US is the worst-affected country with almost 580,000 deaths, followed by Brazil with over 414,000 and then India with over 230,000.
MODERNA VACCINE 96 PER CENT EFFECTIVE IN TEENS
Meanwhile, Moderna said on Thursday (local time) its COVID-19 vaccine is 96 per cent effective among youths aged 12 to 17, according to the results of its first clinical trials.
Two-thirds of the 3235 participants in trials in the United States received the vaccine and one-third were given a placebo.
The study “showed vaccine efficacy against COVID-19 of 96 per cent; mRNA-1273 was generally well tolerated with no serious safety concerns identified to date,” the company said.
Tests detected 12 cases of coronavirus 14 days after the first shot. For these intermediate results, participants were followed up on average 35 days after the second injection.
The pharmaceutical company said that any side effects had been “mild or moderate in severity,” most commonly pain at the injection site. With the second shot, side effects included “headache, fatigue, myalgia and chills,” similar to those observed in adults who had received the vaccine.
“No serious safety concerns have been identified to date,” it said. Moderna said it is currently “in discussions with regulators about a potential amendment to its regulatory filings” to authorise the vaccine for this age group. It is currently only certified for people aged 18 and over in countries where it has already been approved.
Pfizer and BioNTech have already applied for authorisation of their own vaccine for 12-15 year olds in the United States and Europe. On Wednesday, Canada became the first country to authorise the Pfizer shot for this age group.
The vaccination of teens is the next step in the campaign to eventually contain the epidemic. Moderna also began trials of its vaccine in children aged six months to 11 years in March.
Pfizer and BioNTech announced on Tuesday that they hope to file an emergency authorisation request for their vaccine for children aged two to 11 in September in the United States.
Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said the company could apply for authorisation to inoculate children aged between from 6 months and two years “in the fourth quarter.”
BIDEN’S ‘EXTRAORDINARY’ BACKFLIP
On Wednesday, Mr Biden’s administration has announced its support for a global waiver on patent protections for COVID-19 vaccines, and will negotiate the terms at the World Trade Organisation.
While intellectual property rights for businesses are important, Washington “supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines,” US Trade Representative Katherine Tai said in a statement.
“This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,” she added.
Mr Biden had been under intense pressure from world leaders to agree to waive protections for vaccine manufacturers in order to ramp up production and get the jabs out to more countries as rich nations have swept up the majority of the doses.
Ms Tai said the United States will participate in the negotiations within the World Trade Organisation but cautioned that discussions “will take time given the consensus-based nature of the institution and the complexity of the issues involved.”
The global trade body has for months been facing calls led by India and South Africa to temporarily remove the intellectual property protections on COVID-19 vaccines, in a move proponents say would help boost production in developing countries that so far have received far fewer jabs.
But that notion has until now met fierce opposition from pharmaceutical giants and their host countries, which insist the patents are not the main roadblocks to scaling up production, and warn the move could hamper innovation.
WTO chief Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has been pressing for an international agreement to provide at least a temporary patent waiver.
“We need to have a sense of urgency on how we approach this issue of response to COVID-19 because the world is watching,” she said earlier Wednesday, describing equitable access to the tools to fight the pandemic as the “moral and economic issue of our time.”
FREE BEER, DOUGHNUTS FOR AMERICANS WHO GET JAB
Free beer, free doughnuts, savings bonds — US government officials and businesses are teaming up to encourage Americans to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
US President Joe Biden wants 70 per cent of adults to have received at least one shot by Independence Day on July 4 and overcoming vaccine hesitancy is key to reaching the goal.
“We know there are millions of Americans who need a little bit of encouragement to get the shot,” Mr Biden told reporters earlier this week.
Some 56 per cent of American adults — more than 145 million people — have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine but the pace of vaccination has been declining lately.
Federal, state and local officials are partnering with pharmacies, restaurants, breweries, supermarkets and sports teams to come up with incentives to get people to get their shots.
In New Jersey, Governor Phil Murphy launched a “Shot and a Beer” program to encourage vaccination.
“Any New Jerseyan who gets their first vaccine dose in the month of May and takes their vaccination card to a participating brewery will receive a free beer,” Mr Murphy tweeted.
The offer is only open, of course, to residents of the “Garden State” who are over the age of 21, the legal drinking age in the United States.
Governor Ned Lamont of the state of Connecticut unveiled a similar “Free Drink” promotion with participating restaurants last month.
In Washington, Mayor Muriel Bowser urged residents of the nation’s capital to “come get vaccinated and grab a beer, on us” at the John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts.
FANS CAN GET JAB AT YANKEES, METS GAMES
Meanwhile, New York’s Major-league Baseball teams, the Yankees and the Mets, will give free tickets to fans who get vaccinated for the coronavirus at their ball parks before the games, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Wednesday, local time.
“If you get a vaccination, they will give you a free ticket to the game,” Gov Cuomo said at a press briefing.
In a further move toward returning the country’s largest city to pre-pandemic normality, Cuomo also announced that tickets to Broadway shows would go on sale on Thursday (US time) for performances beginning on September 4.
Originally published as Coronavirus world updates: Germany reacts to Joe Biden’s vaccine waiver plan
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