Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of calls by the President of the United States and NGOs to waive intellectual property rights on COVID-19 vaccines.

Intellectual Property rights have been critical in underpinning innovators’ confidence to form over 300 partnerships - an unprecedented number - which have made real, positive impacts on vaccine delivery; examples include AstraZeneca and the Serum Institute of India, and Pfizer-BioNTech and BIOVAC in South Africa. These examples show what is possible when the right partners work together and share technology.

While we must continue to ensure vaccine production needs are met globally, the WHO news release of 7 October made it clear that, “With global vaccine production now at nearly 1.5 billion doses per month, there is sufficient vaccine from a supply perspective to achieve global vaccination targets”. We must therefore also focus on issues of distribution and delivery to successfully vaccinate the globe.