International Covid-19 Response: Innovation and Access to Treatment

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 5th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the UK Government’s role in ensuring innovation and equitable access to treatment within the international covid-19 response.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for giving us the time to have this debate. I also thank the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), who is in her place, for co-sponsoring the debate with me. We applied for the debate before the summer, but it arguably could not be more timely, given the encouraging news yesterday from the chief investigator of the University of Oxford covid vaccine trial. Results of the trial are due before the end of the year, and there is a small chance of a vaccine being available by then. I echo the comments of the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on coronavirus, my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran): that is promising news, but we should not rely on a vaccine alone.

As has become increasingly clear over the course of this pandemic, a vaccine will not be a silver bullet, and for any vaccine to work effectively, we have to suppress the virus sufficiently within the general population in the first place. None the less, the production of a successful vaccine would be a landmark moment in the fight against covid-19; I recognise and commend that.

In that regard, the reality in the UK is that we are, in relative terms, fortunate. Our scientists and researchers are leading the battle through their ongoing work. We have deals in place in relation to six of the vaccine candidates currently being developed. The Government have now bought access to 340 million potential future doses of vaccine. That equates to five doses for each person in the UK. When a vaccine candidate’s efficacy is proven, we will be at the global forefront of rolling it out—with, I am sure, a particular focus on our healthcare workers and the most vulnerable in our society, many of whom, including in my constituency of North East Fife, have been shielding or taking extra precautions for some months.

As we consider our own situation, we also have to recognise that, as things stand, if a vaccine candidate is approved soon, billions of people—two thirds of the world’s population—are likely to have no access to such a vaccine until 2022 at the earliest. While we might live in hope that a vaccine will be with us in the next six months in the UK, for others, it is a matter of years. That is because, right now, access to covid vaccines is a zero-sum game. A limited number of candidates are being manufactured by a small handful of companies only, and between them, they do not have the capacity to produce dosages in the billions required at a global level.

When the world’s wealthy countries, representing about 13% of the world’s population, bought up access to 50% of future covid vaccine doses, it became very hard for the remaining 6.8 billion people on the planet to obtain the same protections. Almost inevitably, it is less affluent nations, and in particular the most vulnerable countries, that are crowded out. It is important to remember that this is not limited to vaccines, and we are not talking hypothetically about what might happen in the future. It is happening right now, because there are already huge inequalities in access to covid treatments that already exist.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The hon. Lady is laying out clearly the inequalities in the world. I have been present in a number of debates this week in which Members have highlighted the inequalities faced by some ethnic groups and religious minorities. When it comes to receiving any covid help, they are at the end of the queue. When it comes to getting the vaccine, they will be at the very end of the end of the queue. Does she agree that those ethnic minorities and persecuted people must have an opportunity to get a vaccine?

[Wendy Chamberlain]

Absolutely. I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, and I entirely agree with his sentiments. We have seen that those who are on the frontline, those who are marginalised in our society and those from minority backgrounds are often the most impacted, so it is even more important that we consider the treatments and vaccines that are available for them.

The two drugs that have been proven so far to help treat covid-19 are dexamethasone and remdesivir. The entire global stock of remdesivir was bought up by the United States Government during the summer, hence Donald Trump was in a position to receive the drug when he became unwell. What is left of the stock is currently accessible only at a very high price. The manufacturer, Gilead, sells it at almost £2,000 for a five-day course of treatment, yet it is believed that the cost to produce it is £7.

Fortunately, dexamethasone is widely available and a cheaply sourced steroid. If a patient suffering from covid requires ventilation, administering this drug reduces the chance of death by up to a third. That is great news and has greatly improved outcomes for patients who need to be ventilated. But for there to be a chance for that drug to be effective, there must be enough ventilators available for patients who need them, and there must be enough oxygen to supply those ventilators. Again, in some of the most vulnerable places globally, access to those things are very limited. In South Sudan, for example, a report earlier this year stated that there were only four ventilators available in the whole country—four.

This debate is not just about the cost of drugs or vaccines. It is also about the resources, technology and equipment needed to manage a pandemic successfully. Even with easily accessible and cheaper treatments, there is no equality of access internationally. As things stand, we run a serious risk that by 2022 we will inhabit a two-tier planet in terms of the pandemic response.

[Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. Does she share my concern that those parts of the world where people do not have immediate access to healthcare systems also do not have furlough schemes, and people do not have the money to be able to isolate? The public health aspect is just as important as access to medicines.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

I entirely agree. Dare I say it, but even the UK’s Prime Minister this week accepted that the isolate part of the test, trace and isolate system is not working. That is largely driven by the fact that people who have an economic need to continue to work will do so if the supports are not available, and that must be true in other parts of the world as well.

As I was saying, the most affluent countries will inevitably benefit, in terms of vaccines, access to treatment, some form of recovery and a return to aspects of day-to-day life, which we so miss in this place and beyond. For the majority of people in this world, that will, arguably, be a limited prospect; it would be a hollow victory indeed if we can get the virus under control while many people around the world continue to suffer. It would be a false victory, too. Let me go back to the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) that I mentioned at the start. In order for a vaccine to be effective, we need to suppress the virus both at home and abroad, because coronavirus does not respect national borders. No one is safe until everyone is safe. That approach has been endorsed by the UK Government. I thank them for recognising that covid-19 medical products need to be treated as global public goods and for making commitments to deliver on that.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing the debate and apologise for the fact that we have not been able to field a Front-Bench spokesperson from the Scottish National party today. I endorse everything she is saying and the points she is making about the importance of global access to a vaccine, when it is developed. As she says, it should be treated as a common good. We have to seek assurances from the Minister that the UK Government will live up to that, given all the changes they have made to their foreign policy, with the merger of the Department for International Development and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the risk to scrutiny from that, and the potential abolition of the Select Committee chaired by the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion). We have to keep up that pressure on the Government, and I hope we will get a positive response from the Minister today.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

It is always good to find common ground with a fellow Scottish MP, and I absolutely endorse his comments. One reason my party was so opposed to that merger was exactly that: the UK is seen as a global leader in this regard and we do not want anything to risk the continuation of that.

I congratulate the Government on making commitments to deliver on covid medical products being treated as a public good, for example, by contributing to the covid-19 vaccine global access facility, which will help procure and equitably distribute vaccines for covid. I look forward to hearing from the Minister today, but I urge her that we must do more. We must ensure that what the Government are doing on behalf of their own citizens does not unintentionally undermine global efforts. There is simply not enough global co-ordination on equality of access, and the UK has a moral duty to engage further. It is the highest per capita buyer of future vaccine doses in the world; we have bought up 10% of potential doses, despite making up less than 1% of the global population. I wish to mention two steps—which I hope the Minister will consider and commit to—that will be vital in ensuring that equality of access for these treatments and technologies is delivered as they come to fruition.

First, the Government need to recognise that currently there are just a handful of vaccine candidates, which means that production capacity is limited. One important step the UK Government could take is to work through international institutions to help encourage reform of the patent system, given the exceptional circumstances of this pandemic. Currently, there are legal safeguards for members of the World Trade Organisation, which means that members can override patent monopolies if public health is at threat. Germany, Australia and Canada have already taken those steps. South Africa and India have also proposed at a recent WTO meeting that all intellectual property monopolies relating to covid-19 tools, medicines and vaccines should be waived. In these exceptional circumstances, the Government need to be engaging with those ideas.

It is also worth noting that many of the vaccine candidates are being produced or developed using public funds. According to the charity STOPAIDS, the cost of development of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, whose successful outcome we are all awaiting, is being covered by public money, from the UK Government and others. It is a public-funded exercise. Concerningly, STOPAIDS reports that from July next year AstraZeneca will have the ability to determine the future price of the vaccine. Given the timescales that I have outlined, as well as the ongoing uncertainty as we enter winter, with cases climbing again in many parts of the world—we are all too aware of that in this Chamber—clarity on this is essential. We cannot have nations crowded out during vaccine development and then priced out once the vaccine is available.

So much public money is being spent on covid-19 research and development, in all our interests, and it is therefore right that the Government ensure that the products created as a result of that spend are accessible to all. These reports give more weight to the idea of relaxing patents, and that leads me to my second point, which is transparency.

The Government should attach stringent conditions to future funding of covid research and development, to ensure that public money is not being invested into products that will go on to generate exorbitant profits for their owners who, as a result of public funding, have developed a vaccine at low or no cost or limited risk. Those steps will also help to speed up research and development, and will arguably make products more affordable, enabling generic competition, driving prices down and ensuring that people from all over the globe, from the wealthiest nations to the most disadvantaged, can access covid treatments in a swift and timely manner. I hope that the Minister will take those issues into consideration.

The developing situation of what is almost a vaccine nationalism must end. Let us start to engage even more fully with multilateral institutions and our allies. Let us work together to ensure that, this time next year, we are celebrating a pandemic in abeyance worldwide, rather than still being in the shadow of this deadly virus.

--- Later in debate ---

[Wendy Chamberlain]

I thank all Members who contributed to the debate, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) and the hon. Members for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) and for Stockport (Navendu Mishra). A year ago, I was commencing a career break at the start of the general election campaign. On my election to this place—I dare say it was the same for all Members here—none of us foresaw what was coming in 2020.

I remember speaking in my former role as the Liberal Democrats’ International Development spokesperson about the real concern that covid-19 was going to rip through the global south. In some respects, we have not seen that, for a variety of reasons, including the younger populations in some of those countries. That is a positive thing. However, we do not understand the impact of things such as long covid or the mutations that my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon talked about. Although the debate has rightly focused on the vaccine, we have to acknowledge that the public health infrastructure and access to other treatments is a real issue in developing countries and will make the delivery of vaccines more difficult.

The UK is a global leader in this area and has been for a number of years. I note the Minister’s commendable actions to date, but it is clear that there are still key steps to be taken. It is also clear that other countries are now taking those steps, on issues such as patents, waivers and support for the World Health Organisation’s C-TAP—covid-19 technology access pool—which, without UK support, risks being undermined. I thank the Minister, but it is clear that there is much still to do, rather than just giving assurances. We need key commitments and sign-ups, and it is clear that opposition Members will continue to press for those.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the UK Government’s role in ensuring innovation and equitable access to treatment within the international covid-19 response.