The fading mirage of a TRIPS waiver

A year later, the proposal to lift WTO’s intellectual property blocks to making COVID vaccines has not inched forward

- Latha Jishnu

THERE WAS barely any excitement when Australia came out in support of a waiver of intellectual property rights (IPRS) by the World Trade Organization (WTO) on vaccines, treatments and diagnostic devices needed to fight the covid-19 pandemic. Trade Minister Dan Tehan’s announcement just a couple of weeks before the waiver proposal hit its anniversary—after a dismal year of inaction by WTO even as millions died following the outbreak of sars-cov-2—caused hardly a blip. The cardiograph charting the waiver proposal's progress has been flat since it was first proposed by South Africa and India on October 2, 2020, barring the time when the Joe Biden administration caused a sensation— unwarrantedly, this column has argued—with its backing for a limited waiver on vaccines in May this year.

So now Australia has joined over 100 other countries in seeking a limited waiver of IPRS that are enshrined in the trips agreement of WTO. Does it really matter? Only a dogged optimist would say it does. For all one knows, it could be just a kite-flying exercise, since Tehan made Canberra’s shift instance known at a meeting with community organisations. Just a month earlier, Tehan had been singing the usual paeans to the role of IPRS in promoting innovation and had put it on record that the government felt voluntary mechanisms were the best option for increasing access to vaccines. In a letter written to community organisations, the minister had cited the scarcity of raw materials and the lack of manufacturing capacity as major barriers to increased production of vaccines. It also pointed to the key role of intellectual property protections in encouraging the development of new vaccines and tests and treatments.