*Below is an open letter calling on the UK International Trade Secretary to push for an end to COVID monopolies ahead of a key meeting in June - click the button at the bottom to add your name in support of the letter!*
Dear Secretary of State for International Trade,
We are writing to you as a group of clinically vulnerable patients and people who have lost family members overseas who were unable to access COVID vaccines, to ask you to do all in your power to end the deadly COVID monopolies that are perpetuating this global suffering.
We are:
Rasha - a London based doctor whose Grandmother died of COVID in Iraq in 2021, without access to the vaccine
Melanie - a Cardiff based clinically vulnerable patient who had to live separately from her young child during parts of the pandemic
Sakina - a London-based journalist whose father died of COVID last year in Tanzania, without access to the vaccine
Izzie - a clinically vulnerable cystic fibrosis patient based in Sussex, who has been shielding since the start of the pandemic
Because of the failure to vaccinate globally, we have lost those dear to us in countries which ended up at the back of the vaccine access queue. As clinically vulnerable patients, this global vaccination failure has greatly increased the risks for us, as inequitable vaccination means more risk of variants, which pose a real threat to our health.
To date only 16% of people in low income countries have received even one vaccine dose. We are in a vaccine apartheid, and are beginning to see the same scenario play out in relation to COVID treatments, with wealthy countries including the UK having bought up nearly all Pfizer and MSD’s stocks of Covid-19 drugs for 2022.
The TRIPS waiver proposal, put forward by India and South Africa at the WTO in October 2020, would break the pharmaceutical company monopolies that are preventing the scale up of urgently needed COVID health tools while simultaneously allowing companies like Pfizer to rake in billions in profit.
Over 100 countries already support the proposal - but now the EU and the WTO are pushing a counter proposal which would fail to address any of the Intellectual Property barriers that are preventing billions of people from accessing the vaccines and treatments they need.
In the run up to the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) Ministerial meeting in June, we urge you to push for an end to the COVID monopolies that continue to stand in the way of people’s access to vaccines, treatments and diagnostics in the Global South. Please will you use your position and influence to reject the new proposal and instead advocate for the original TRIPS waiver proposal, as put forward by India and South Africa in 2020?
Yours,
Rasha Mezher-Sikafi
Melanie Duddridge
Sakina Datoo
Izzie Jani-Friend