WHO formally adopts pandemic agreement after three years of negotiation
After three long years of negotiation members of the World Health Organization (WHO) formally adopted the Pandemic Agreement at the 78th World Health Assembly in Geneva on Tuesday.
The treaty aims to make the world safer from future pandemics by encouraging better disease surveillance and sharing of vaccines and other medicines during major outbreaks.
Despite fears to the contrary, it explicitly rules out any role for the WHO over individual states, with powers over issues such as travel restrictions, vaccine mandates and lockdowns remaining outside its remit.
Clause 22.2 says: 'Nothing in the WHO Pandemic Agreement shall be interpreted as providing the Secretariat of the World Health Organization, including the Director-General of the World Health Organization, any authority to direct, order, alter or otherwise prescribe the national and/or domestic law'.
It is only the second legally binding convention or agreement to be adopted in the WHO's history after the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control of 2003, and it received overwhelming backing from member states.
A formal vote was forced by Slovakia's vaccine sceptic prime minister Robert Fico who last month stopped purchases of Covid-19 vaccines after a party colleague claimed they turn people into 'genetically modified organisms' without their knowledge.
Yet in the end, 124 countries voted in favour late on Monday evening, while 11, including Poland, Israel, Italy, Russia, Slovakia and Iran abstained. None voted against. The agreement was then formally adopted by the WHO at a plenary of the WHC on Tuesday morning.
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO, welcomed the accord as a victory for multilateralism and common sense.
'Governments from all over the world are making their countries, and our interconnected global community, more equitable, healthier and safer from the threats posed by pathogens and viruses of pandemic potential,' he said.
'I congratulate WHO's Member States for resolving to come together in the aftermath of Covid-19 to better protect the world from future pandemics. Their work to develop this global accord will ensure countries work better, faster and more equitably together to prevent and respond to the next pandemic threat.'
The agreement will not formally take force until an annex on pathogen sharing is negotiated, which could take another two years, after which states will still have to ratify the accord.
There is also concern that the original ambition for the agreement has been diluted over time, with much of the wording signalling intent rather than firmly specifying action.
Importantly, however, participating drug manufacturers must allocate a target of 20 per cent of their vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics to the WHO during a pandemic.
A minimum 10 per cent are free-of-charge 'donations', with the rest reserved at affordable prices, to be distributed to poorer nations who cannot afford them.
Clause 9.5 of the agreement also encourages governments which use tax payers money to fund original scientific research on vaccines and other innovations to ensure that the institutions and companies which receive backing are legally obligated to share their technology during a health emergency.
It was the original research the US government funded ahead of time on the spike protein of coronaviruses that enabled companies like Moderna to produce vaccines so quickly during the Covid-19 outbreak.
Following three years of difficult negotiations, the agreement is seen by many as a victory for global cooperation at a time when multilateralism is under threat.
In January President Donald Trump announced the US was leaving the WHO and – just as with the tobacco treaty – it will not be bound by the Pandemic Agreement as things stand.
Yet there is a sense in which the treaty has united the organisation's remaining members, with several countries including China sending huge delegations to this year's gathering.
'Some say the agreement is just symbolic but symbolism isn't trivial,' said one senior observer in Geneva on Monday.
Nina Schwalbe, the founder of global health think tank Spark Street Advisors, described the treaty as 'a landmark agreement… that will make countries better prepared for the next pandemic'.
'There is work to do ahead – most urgently on pathogen access and benefit sharing but the road ahead is clear,' she added.
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