International Covid-19 Response: Innovation and Access to Treatment

Navendu Mishra Excerpts

Thursday 5th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) for securing this important and timely debate. I pay tribute to the many organisations that have campaigned so powerfully on this issue, including Global Justice Now, Doctors Without Borders, and Just Treatment.

We are in the middle of battling a global pandemic, and in order to successfully overcome it, there must be a united cross-border approach. Anything less only undermines the United Kingdom’s reputation as a development superpower. It also jeopardises the health of our citizens, given the rapid speed at which the virus travels around the world. The Government’s failure to provide equitable access to covid vaccines means that many developing countries that already have overstretched and underfunded healthcare systems will suffer further still if they are unable to access affordable covid vaccines. As a member of the International Development Committee —it is great to see the Chair of the Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), in the Chamber—I know how the coronavirus crisis could set development progress back by 30 years. That is completely unacceptable, and a failure to intervene to prevent it would be wanton disregard for our international obligations. Countries in the global south should not continually be down the pecking order: they must be prioritised in order to help them, and us, to overcome this deadly virus.

Our Government must take the lead in tackling this crisis, but pharmaceutical companies must also play their part in finding a cure. Currently, the Government are handing billions to big pharma, which is taking very little risk while maintaining monopoly control of the drugs once they are developed. For example, AstraZeneca has stated that its costs in developing a covid vaccine at Oxford University will be fully covered by Governments. This approach will serve only to exacerbate gross health inequalities and cannot be tolerated during a pandemic when tens of thousands of lives are at stake. Terms and conditions must be attached to any funding the Government provide to ensure innovations for all those who need them, including those living in low-income and middle-income countries. Indeed, the Government should not relinquish their responsibility to introduce stringent public interest conditions on their funding to ensure equitable access. That means, with millions of pounds of public money going into the research and development of future covid medical technologies, that it is critical that the final products are sold at cost, and that the pharmaceutical companies do not profiteer from public funding when Governments are required to buy back the products that they initially funded the development of.

We are now in the ninth month of this crisis, yet there remains no clear policy from this Government to ensure that grantees ensure effective technology transfer, open sharing, and licensing of covid medical technologies to ensure that there is sustainable follow-on development and manufacturing globally, especially in the very poorest countries. That is why more than 130 cross-parliamentarians, led by the all-party parliamentary group on vaccines for all, wrote to the Government, as far back as April, to call for equitable access to a coronavirus vaccine. This followed the announcement that £250 million will be pledged to its funding, research and development. We have yet to see any stipulations attached to this funding. This is despite a YouGov poll commissioned by the Wellcome Trust that found that 96% of adults in the UK believe that national Governments should work together to ensure that all treatments and vaccines are manufactured in as many countries as possible and distributed globally to whoever needs them. Therefore, I would like to hear from the Minister whether the Government will stipulate that, as a condition of any covid funding, any vaccine and medical product developed as a result of public money will not be patented and exclusively licensed.

I would also like to hear from the Minister whether the Government will join more than 30 countries in supporting the World Health Organisation’s covid accessible technology initiative, aimed at making vaccines, tests, treatments and other health technologies to fight covid accessible to all. This would stop situations arising like the one I mentioned with AstraZeneca, which followed assurances from Oxford researchers that they would maximise access to the vaccine through open licensing before they subsequently signed an agreement with the pharmaceutical company. Although it has claimed that it will not make any profit from the vaccine during the pandemic, it was recently revealed that AstraZeneca has built a clause into the deal that states that the covid-19 crisis will be considered over in July 2021, regardless of what the situation is globally, at which point it will be able to hike its prices and begin profiteering. As the Financial Times made public last month, AstraZeneca’s deal with Oxford University allows it to make as much as 20% on top of the cost of goods for manufacturing the vaccine, and it has declined to reveal how much it is to produce.

The hon. Member for North East Fife made a very important point regarding the proposal set out by South Africa and India to waive intellectual property rights on health advances against covid-19. At-cost prices for pharmaceutical companies should be the norm, not the exception. Any profiteering will clearly hamper the ability of Governments and health systems around the world, including our own national health service, to be able to afford enough vaccines to meet the needs of their populations. We cannot have a situation whereby this or any other crisis is being privatised and putting at risk the lives of those who cannot afford or access vital vaccinations.

Will the Minister therefore provide assurance that the Government do indeed have plans to ensure responsible pricing for this vaccine both for our own health service and those of our global partners, and do so over the time-limited assurances such as those provided by AstraZeneca? Will the Minister also explain the Government’s reasons for failing to demand transparency of the conditions attached to public research and development funding, as well as for licences and agreements related to the Oxford University and AstraZeneca covid vaccine? This immoral situation cannot be allowed to continue, and the Government must now consider issuing Crown use licences in the case of future shortages of life-saving covid products and medicines.

This will help to offset the failure of the current patent system, which has dominated biomedical research for decades and hindered the rapid roll-out of equipment in countries that urgently need it as well as access to affordable vaccines. That is why I supported the call by the shadow Foreign Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), earlier this year, ahead of the global vaccine summit in the UK, to end the unilateral approach to accessing vaccines at the expense of other countries as well as to overturn export bans on potential covid products.

As I have made clear, multilateral collaboration is not simply the only way to ensure equitable access for all, but the only path for putting in place a global cure to end this pandemic, prevent an endless cycle of lockdowns and ensure that our country’s physical and economic health recovers as quickly as possible.