The WHO Pandemic Treaty Fails Again - Brett D. Schaefer and Steven Groves

Schaefer and Steven Groves In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the KEY TAKEAWAYS World Health Organization (WHO) launched a process to update the International Health Reg- The latest iteration of the World Health ulations (IHR) and draft a “convention, agreement or Organization’s proposed pandemic other international instrument under the Constitu- Agreement retains many provisions that are. [...] But Article 11 of the agreement also calls on the parties to “encourage” rights holders to forego or reduce royalties of their products and knowhow during a pandemic, consider time bound waivers of intellectual property rights, and “recognize that they have the right to use to the full, the flexibilities inherent in the TRIPS Agreement as reiterated in the Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement a. [...] l Article 28 of the draft now permits declarations and understandings, but only if “such declarations or statements do not purport to exclude or to modify the legal effect of the provisions of the WHO Pandemic Agreement in their application to that State.” The very point of decla- rations and understandings is to clarify the scope of treaty provisions. [...] Article 29 of the draft pandemic agreement specifies that the “text of any proposed amendment to the WHO Pandemic Agreement shall be communicated to the Parties by the Secretariat at least six months before the session at which it is proposed for adoption.” This is appropriate, as governments and civil society need transparency and reasonable time to assess the final proposals, and should apply ev. [...] World Health Organization, Working Group on Amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005), “Interim Report of the Seventh Meeting of the Working Group on Amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005),” Seventh Meeting of the Working Group on Amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005), Agenda Item 5, A/WGIHR/7/3, February 22, 2024, .