The NGO Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) published, on Monday 19 April, the results of an investigation into the influence of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) on the European Commission regarding intellectual property rights on Covid-19 vaccines and medicines.
Based on a series of documents made public at its request, the NGO says that the Commission has “basically agreed to the wishes of the pharmaceutical industry”, which is opposed to the temporary suspension of intellectual property rights on vaccines and medicines for the duration of the pandemic - a suspension proposed by several countries at the World Trade Organization.
Corporate Europe Observatory reveals the arguments used by EFPIA - whose lobbying expenses may have reached €5.5 million in 2020, according to the NGO - to defend the monopoly of intellectual property rights on vaccines.
The pharmaceutical industry told the European Commission in December: “everything is in good hands, we will make sure vaccines reach everyone across the globe, there is no need for extraordinary measures. [...] Today it should be clear to everybody that this is not the case. We need expansion of vaccine manufacturing through technology sharing”, commented Kenneth Haar, researcher at the Corporate Europe Observatory.
See the survey: https://bit.ly/3gnWGOc (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)