WIREDGOV

Leaders of the G20 recently (21 May 2021) committed to a series of actions to accelerate the end of the COVID-19 crisis everywhere and better prepare for future pandemics, at a summit co-hosted by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, as G20 chair.

President Ursula von der Leyen recently said:

“This very first G20 summit on health marks the beginning of a new chapter in global health policy. World leaders strongly committed to multilateralism and global cooperation in health. This means, no export bans, keeping global supply chains open and working to extend production capacity everywhere. If we live up to these principles, the world will be better prepared for pandemics.”

The G20 underlined the importance of increased and diversified manufacturing and recognised the role of intellectual property in ensuring equity, both through voluntary licensing and knowledge transfer, as well as in the context of the flexibilities provided by the TRIPS agreement. In that respect, the EU intends to facilitate the implementation of those flexibilities, in particular the use of compulsory licenses including for exports to all countries that lack manufacturing capacity.*

The EU will come forward with a proposal in the WTO focusing on:

• clarifying and facilitating the use of compulsory licences in crisis times like this pandemic;
• supporting the expansion of production;
• trade facilitation and limiting export restrictions.

All G20 members also acknowledged the need to address the funding gap of the ACT-Accelerator, a global collaboration to accelerate development, production, and equitable access to COVID-19 tests, treatments, and vaccines, and launched by the WHO, the European Commission, France and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. And agreed to extend its mandate to the end of 2022.

The leaders further agreed on the need for early warning information, surveillance and trigger systems, which will be interoperable. These will cover new viruses, but also variants. They will enable countries to detect much quicker and to act to nip in the bud outbreaks, before they become pandemics.

G20 clearly stressed the need to ensure equitable access to vaccines and to support low and middle-income countries.

Team Europe' contribution

‘Team Europe' presented to the summit concrete contributions to respond to this call, both to cover immediate needs and to build capacity in the medium term.

The European Commission has worked with industrial partners, which are manufacturing vaccines in Europe, to make available vaccine doses for low and middle-income countries, rapidly.

BioNTech/Pfizer (1 billion), Johnson & Johnson (200 million) and Moderna (around 100 million) pledged 1.3 billion doses of vaccines, to be delivered to low-income countries at no profit, and to middle-income countries at lower prices by the end of 2021, many of which will go via COVAX. They committed more than 1 billion doses for 2022.

Team Europe aims at donating 100 million doses of vaccines to low and middle-income countries until the end of the year, in particular through COVAX.

In addition to covering current vaccine needs, Team Europe will also invest to equip Africa to produce vaccines itself. Africa imports today 99% of its own vaccines. Team Europe has launched an initiative to boost manufacturing capacity in Africa and access to vaccines, medicines and health technologies. The initiative, backed by €1 billion funding from the EU budget and European development finance institutions such as the European Investment Bank, will cover investments in infrastructure and production capacity. But also in training and skills, supply chains management, regulatory framework.

Under the initiative, a number of regional production hubs will be developed, covering the whole African continent.

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