Supply of Covid-19 vaccines being artificially rationed, alliance warns

The supply of vaccines is being artificially rationed due to the protection of exclusive rights and monopolies of pharmaceutical companies, the People’s Vaccine Alliance has warned.

The People’s Vaccine Alliance highlights how purchasing agreement between rich countries and the developers of Covid-19 vaccines is resulting in a much lower coverage rate around the world.

Indeed, as of 4 February, a total of 108 million Covid-19 vaccine doses had been administered across 67 countries. However, only 4.4% of these vaccinations have been given in developing countries. The Peoples Vaccine Alliance says that the limited supply of the approved vaccines means that unless action is taken only one in 10 people will be vaccinated by the end of the year in many developing countries.

The People’s Vaccine Alliance is now urging governments and the pharmaceutical industry to scale up production of Covid-19 vaccines. The People’s Vaccine Alliance is calling for the removal of artificial barriers, including suspending intellectual property rules, sharing technology and ending monopoly control, so that everyone has access to a vaccine as quickly as possible.

The call comes after tension between the EU and the UK, with the bloc suffering vaccine shortages from its supplier AstraZeneca. The EU threatened to restrict Covid-19 vaccine exports from the EU reaching the UK in order to protect its supplies.

Anna Marriott, Oxfam’s health policy manager said: “The world is in a race to reach herd immunity to get this disease under control, save millions of lives and get our economy going again. This is a race we have to win before new mutations render our existing vaccines obsolete. Yet the pursuit of profits and monopolies means we are losing that race. 

“People out there would be forgiven for thinking that every major vaccine company is working flat out to vaccinate the world, but this is simply not the case. We need every company on earth who can make safe and effective vaccines for Covid-19 to be making them right now. We urgently need to lift the veil of corporate secrecy and instead have open-source vaccines, mass produced by as many vaccine players as possible, including crucially those in developing countries.

“By refusing to share their technology and waive their intellectual property, companies like Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech, are artificially rationing the supply of successful vaccines with the hopes of reaping huge financial rewards. This is despite both benefiting from huge public subsidy. This will cost lives and prolong the economic pain which is hitting the poorest hardest.”

In particular, the alliance has criticised GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Merck and Sanofi for largely sitting on the sidelines during Covid-19 and the production of vaccines.

Current plans in place by GSK and Sanofi will only amount to 225 million vaccine doses developed this year.

GSK is working with CureVac to develop a vaccine to tackle emerging variants of Covid-19, and Sanofi will produce 125 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.

Sanofi and GSK had planned to produce 1 billion doses of their joint Covid-19 vaccine in 2021, before clinical trials yielded less than positive results.

Merck too announced it was discontinuing its development of a Covid-19 vaccine after clinical trials showed disappointing efficacy data.

Sanofi and GSK received $2.1 billion in funding from the US government as part of its Operation Warp Speed initiative.

The People’s Vaccine Alliance also states that production capacity in developing countries is likely being overlooked. For instance, whilst the Serum Institute of India is already producing hundreds of millions of vaccines for Covid-19 on behalf of AstraZeneca and Novovax, there are other vaccine manufacturers in India who could begin production if they had intellectual property licenses.

The People’s Vaccine Alliance is calling on US President Joe Biden and the governments of the UK and EU to use their emergency powers and to leverage their massive public funding to put pressure on Pfizer/ BioNTech, Astra Zeneca, Moderna and other subsequently successful vaccine producers, to openly share their vaccine science and technology, to waive their patents and insist that all other major vaccine producers get involved in production. 

Lois Chingandu, director of Frontline AIDS, said: “Over $100 billion of taxpayers money has funded these vaccines, while the companies behind the three successful vaccine candidates are set to make over $30 billion in revenue this year alone.

“Public investments mean these are public goods, which should be used to benefit all humanity, not private property there to benefit shareholders. Leaders must act now to override this broken system of patents, monopolies and secrecy to deliver a People’s Vaccine for all.”

The alliance is also calling on the US and other governments like Germany to invest in new production facilities especially in developing countries, in order to massively scale up the production of safe and effective vaccines and to build infrastructure that can respond better to future pandemics.

Heidi Chow, senior campaigns and policy manager at Global Justice Now, said: "Business as usual is not enough in a global pandemic. In times of war, manufacturers have often put aside normal competition to work together for a common cause. Surely governments should be insisting that the same spirit applies today, when so many people’s lives and livelihoods are at stake?"