TWN Info Service on Intellectual Property Issues (Mar21/11)
25 March 2021
Third World Network

UN: HRC calls for equitable & universal access to COVID-19 vaccines
Published in SUNS #9313 dated 25 March 2021

Geneva, 24 Mar (Kanaga Raja) – The United Nations Human Rights Council on Tuesday called upon States and other relevant stakeholders “to take appropriate measures to guarantee the fair, transparent, equitable, efficient, universal and timely access and distribution of safe, quality, efficacious, effective, accessible and affordable COVID-19 vaccines, and to enable international cooperation” in combating the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a resolution (A/HRC/46/L.25/Rev.1) adopted without a vote, and as orally revised, the Human Rights Council emphasized “the urgent need for ensuring the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health and for facilitating the development of robust health systems and universal health coverage, encompassing universal, timely and equitable access to all essential health technologies, diagnostics, therapeutics, medicines and vaccines in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and other health emergencies, in order to ensure full access to immunization for all, in particular persons and groups in vulnerable situations, as a matter of global priority for all States.”

The Council recognized that “the availability of vaccines, medicines, health technologies and health therapies is an essential dimension of the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.”

It noted that, since the beginning of the vaccine roll-out, the majority of all vaccines administered have been concentrated in high-income countries, while low-income countries still lag behind in gaining access to COVID-19 vaccines.

The Council expressed serious concern “over the disparity between developing countries and developed countries in terms of the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, which prevents the entire international community from achieving the complete elimination of COVID-19 as soon as possible, and also further hampers progress in the realization of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”

It underscored that “equitable access to health products is a matter of global priority and that the availability, accessibility, acceptability and affordability of health products of assured quality are fundamental to tackling the pandemic.”

It expressed concern about the fact that the unequal distribution of vaccines delays the ending of the pandemic.

In response to the adoption of the resolution by the Human Rights Council, Tamaryn Nelson, Health Advisor at Amnesty International, said: “This resolution is yet another urgent reminder that vaccine access is a basic human right that every single person is entitled to.”

“The resolution rightly calls for increased international cooperation, and expresses serious concern over the global disparity in access to COVID-19 vaccines. It emphasizes the urgent need for states to fulfil the right to health and the right to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications, which includes access to vaccines,” Nelson added.

“States must cooperate to ensure vaccines are developed and manufactured in sufficient supply, and distributed in a timely and equitable manner around the globe. Businesses, especially the pharmaceutical industry, must live up to their human rights responsibilities and make every effort to ensure that vaccines are affordable and accessible to the maximum number of people worldwide,” Nelson said further.

“To this end, Amnesty International urges states and businesses to work together to ensure that intellectual property rules do not prevent any countries from upholding the right to health,” Nelson added.

“This includes agreeing to a temporary “waiver” on certain aspects of the TRIPS Agreement for the production of COVID-19 health products, and joining the WHO’s COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP), a shared platform for knowledge and technology that aims to increase global supply of vaccines.”

In the resolution adopted at its 46th regular session, the Human Rights Council recognized “the importance of international cooperation and effective multilateralism in ensuring that all States, in particular developing States, including the least developed States, have affordable, timely, equitable and universal access to COVID-19 vaccines in order to minimize negative effects in all affected States and to avoid the resurgence of the pandemic.”

It recognized further that “universal health coverage implies that all people have access without discrimination to nationally determined sets of needed promotive, preventive, curative, palliative and rehabilitative essential health-care services and essential, safe, affordable, effective and quality medicines and vaccines, while ensuring that the use of these services does not expose users to financial hardship, with special emphasis on the poor, vulnerable and marginalized segments of the population.”

The Council was deeply concerned about the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the enjoyment of human rights around the world, and emphasized the importance of human rights in shaping the response to the pandemic, both in terms of the public health emergency and the broader impact on people’s lives and livelihoods.

It reaffirmed the fundamental role of the United Nations system in coordinating the global response to control and contain the spread of COVID-19 and in providing support to States, and in this regard, acknowledged the crucial leading role played by the World Health Organization.

The Council was deeply concerned that “the COVID-19 pandemic perpetuates and exacerbates existing inequalities and that those most at risk are persons in vulnerable and marginalized situations, including older persons, migrants, refugees, internally displaced persons, persons with disabilities, persons belonging to minorities, indigenous peoples, persons deprived of their liberty, homeless persons and persons living in poverty.”

It recognized the need to ensure non-discrimination and equality, and stressed the importance of age-responsive, gender-responsive and disability-sensitive measures in this regard.

It noted with concern “the uneven access to quality, safe, efficacious and affordable COVID-19 vaccines and the difficulties that a large number of countries face in gaining access to and supplying them to their populations.”

It stressed the important role of the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator initiative, as well as other relevant initiatives that “are aimed at accelerating development, production and equitable access to COVID-19 diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines to all countries and at strengthening health systems, and recognized in particular its vaccines pillar, the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access (COVAX) Facility, which will be key to ensuring an equitable global distribution of vaccines to all States.”

The Council recognized that “the COVID-19 pandemic requires a global response based on unity, solidarity and multilateral cooperation, to ensure that all States, in particular developing States, including the least developed countries, have unhindered, timely, fair and equitable access to safe diagnostics, therapeutics, medicines, vaccines and essential health technologies and their components, as well as equipment, bearing in mind that immunization against COVID-19 is a global public good for health in preventing, containing and stopping transmission, in order to bring the pandemic to an end.”

The Council called for “intensified international cooperation and solidarity to contain, mitigate and overcome the pandemic and its consequences, including the human rights implications, through responses that are people-centred, gender-responsive, multi-dimensional, coordinated, inclusive, innovative, swift and decisive at all levels, with full respect for human rights, including by supporting the exchange of information, scientific knowledge and best practices and enhancing maintenance capacity, in particular to assist people in vulnerable situations, including all migrants, and the poorest and most vulnerable countries, to build a more equitable, inclusive, sustainable and resilient future and to realize the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”

It encouraged States to work in partnership with all relevant stakeholders to increase research and development funding for vaccines and medicines, leverage digital technologies and strengthen the international scientific cooperation necessary to combat COVID-19 and to bolster coordination, including with the private sector, towards the further development, manufacturing and distribution of diagnostics, antiviral medicines, personal protective equipment and vaccines, while adhering to the objectives of quality, efficacy, safety, equity, accessibility and affordability.

The Council recognized “the importance of tools to achieve extensive immunization against COVID-19 as a global public good for health in preventing, containing and stopping transmission, in order to bring the pandemic to an end, by ensuring the availability of safe, quality, efficacious, effective, accessible and affordable vaccines.”

It called upon States and other relevant stakeholders “to remove unjustified obstacles restricting the export of COVID-19 vaccines, resulting in an unequal distribution in access to them between developed and developing countries, and to promote equitable global distribution and universal access to vaccines, in order to further the principles of international cooperation and solidarity, to end the current pandemic and to promote the realization of the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.”

The Council urged States to facilitate the trade, acquisition, access and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, as a crucial element of their responses to the pandemic, to ensure the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health and to support the administration of vaccines to address the pandemic, in accordance with international human rights obligations and the Sustainable Development Goals and other international legal frameworks, taking into account the principles of non-discrimination and transparency.

It reiterated the call for States “to continue to collaborate, as appropriate, on models and approaches that support the de-linking of the cost of new research and development from the prices of medicines, vaccines and diagnostics for diseases, to ensure their sustained accessibility, affordability and availability and to support access to treatment for all those in need.”

The Council called upon States and all relevant stakeholders to promote research and capacity-building initiatives, as well as to enhance cooperation on and access to science, innovation, technologies, technical assistance and knowledge-sharing, to ensure universal, equitable and affordable access for all persons to COVID-19 vaccines, including through improved coordination among mechanisms, especially with developing countries, in a collaborative, coordinated and transparent manner and on mutually agreed terms, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and towards advancing the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals.

It urged States to leverage digital technologies for the response to COVID-19, including in support of efficient, transparent and robust immunization, addressing the socioeconomic impact of COVID-19, paying particular attention to digital inclusion, patient empowerment and the right to privacy and protection of personal data.

The Council reaffirmed the right of States “to use the provisions of the World Trade Organization Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) and the flexibilities therein, as reaffirmed in the Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health, in which it is recognized that the agreement should be interpreted and implemented in a manner supportive of the right of States to protect public health, in particular to promote access to medicines for all, to facilitate access for all to COVID-19 vaccines and to bolster coordination, including with the private sector, towards the rapid development, manufacturing and distribution of vaccines, while adhering to the objectives of transparency, efficacy, safety, equity, accessibility and affordability.”

It called upon States, other partners and donors to urgently support funding and close the funding gap for the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator and its mechanisms, such as the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access (COVAX) Facility, support the equitable distribution of diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines and further explore innovative financing mechanisms aimed at ensuring affordable, timely, equitable and universal access to, and the fair distribution of, COVID-19 vaccines for all and the continuity and strengthening of essential health services.

It also called upon the international community to continue to assist developing countries in promoting the full realization of the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health and the right of everyone to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications, including through access to medicines that are affordable, safe, efficacious and of quality and through financial and technical support for and training of personnel, while recognizing that the primary responsibility for promoting and protecting all human rights rests with States.

The Council requested “all States, international organizations and relevant stakeholders to commit to transparency in all matters related to the production, distribution and fair pricing of vaccines, in accordance with national and regional legal frameworks.”

It urged States “to immediately take steps to prevent speculation and undue export controls and stockpiling that may hinder affordable, timely, equitable and universal access for all countries to COVID-19 vaccines.”

It recognized the immense logistical challenges posed by the lack of infrastructure related to the distribution of vaccines in developing countries, including the least developed countries, and called for greater assistance and building the capacities of developing countries, including through effective training programmes in vaccine delivery in this regard.

The Council strongly urged all States “to refrain from taking any economic, financial or trade measures that may adversely affect equitable, affordable, fair, timely and universal access to COVID-19 vaccines, in particular in developing countries.”

It requested the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in consultation with States, United Nations agencies, funds and programmes, in particular the World Health Organization, the special procedures of the Human Rights Council, the treaty bodies, civil society organizations and other stakeholders, to prepare a report on the human rights implications of the lack of affordable, timely, equitable and universal access and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and the deepening inequalities between States, including the related vulnerabilities and challenges and the impact on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, for submission to the Human Rights Council, at its forty-ninth session, and to provide an oral update thereon to the Council at its forty-eighth session.

It also decided to hold, at its forty-ninth session, a half-day panel discussion on the matter and requested the Office of the High Commissioner to make the discussion fully accessible to persons with disabilities.