According to Ursula von der Leyen, “a new chapter in the history of global public health” opened on Friday 21 May in Rome with the first global health summit since the Covid-19 pandemic, co-chaired by the Italian G20 Presidency and the President of the European Commission.
Heads of State or Government and international organisations adopted the Rome Declaration, whose agreed principles set the stage for enhanced international cooperation to emerge from the Covid-19 crisis and improve preparedness for future ones through sustainable and comprehensive solutions (see EUROPE 12723/2).
“World leaders have made a strong commitment to multilateralism and global cooperation on health. This means not banning exports, keeping global supply chains open, and striving to expand production capacity around the world”, said Ms von der Leyen.
The slogan “No one is safe until everyone is safe” was a recurring theme throughout the day, expressing the conviction of all participants that the world’s population must be vaccinated as soon as possible.
“As we prepare for the next pandemic, our priority must be to ensure that we overcome the current pandemic together. We need to vaccinate the world, and fast”, said Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi at the opening of the summit.
At the close, he welcomed the declaration and the commitments made as a “solid basis for strengthening our response to pandemics and ensuring that we are better prepared”.
He mentioned in particular: – strengthening the role of multilateral organisations; – a commitment to increase funding for the WHO to make it more effective; – international guidance to inform an early warning systems and health policies, but also to address economic risks; – recognition of the importance of the ‘One Health’ approach; – advocating a multilateral (global) trading system to eliminate export bans; and – collaboration with pharmaceutical companies to stimulate innovation.
Financial commitments to close the $8.5 billion funding gap for ACT-A (the Action Accelerator) and the announcement of concrete initiatives marked the summit.
Pointing out that middle-income countries had so far received only 2% of the vaccines produced, Bill Gates said at the pre-summit meeting with the participation of private actors that two immediate actions were needed: “share the dollars and the doses to close the gap by 2021”.
Beyond the announcement of at least 100 million doses that the EU, its Member States, and financial institutions (‘Team Europe’) would donate to low- and middle-income countries by the end of 2021, Ms von der Leyen also announced a new initiative to support vaccine production hubs across Africa.
At the end of the summit, she said she was pleased that pharmaceutical companies had pledged 1.3 billion doses of vaccines this year for poor countries—at no profit for the poorest countries and at a lower cost for middle-income countries.
Pfizer announced 2 billion doses for middle-income countries over the next 18 months (1 billion this year and 1 billion in 2022); Johnson & Johnson announced that it has contracted with GAVI to deliver up to 200 million doses via Covax by the end of the year; and Moderna has committed to 95 million doses by the end of 2021 and 900 million by 2022.
The Commission President also welcomed a key step towards cooperation between all governments to use all the flexibilities of the TRIPS agreements to provide equitable access to vaccines.
French President Emmanuel Macron said he was ready to support such an initiative, subject to a prior joint report from the WHO and WTO.
France will provide €500 million for ACT-A and “at least 30 million doses of different vaccines” to Covax by the end of the year. “We are not allowed to stockpile vaccines in some countries while others are in short supply. And it’s shocking that we sometimes start vaccinating children where we haven’t yet started vaccinating the oldest, most fragile people in other countries”, he said.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa warned against “vaccine nationalism at the expense of lives” and thanked the EU for being ready to start discussions on the temporary lifting of intellectual property rights requested with India at the WTO and supported by 100 countries.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has pledged 30 million doses by the end of the year and stressed the importance of “increasing vaccine production worldwide, especially in Africa”.
For his part, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, stressed that the future Treaty on Pandemics, of which he is a strong promoter, could both cover crisis prevention, allow for the exchange of scientific data, and ensure that in the future, we can better work together on restrictive measures to secure supply chains. “I really hope that the concerns can be addressed”, he said, aware of some reservations about the project.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said a treaty would allow for common protocols, zero tariffs on essential equipment, research hubs, early warning systems for new variants of emerging, and re-emerging diseases to build “a collective defence”.
US Vice President Kamala Harris said that “a new era of global health must be at the centre of our work”, as she said that global health has an impact on global security, the global economy, and the future. “We need to vaccinate people”, she said.
The US has so far announced 80 million doses of vaccine via Covax. They are not enthusiastic about a treaty at this stage.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged $3 billion over 3 years to help fight the pandemic and support economic recovery.
On behalf of the EU Council Presidency, Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa stressed that the EU is one of the largest contributors to Covax and is working on a European vaccine sharing mechanism. “The pandemic took us by surprise, but we have learned that it is better to fight a pandemic together than separately. The EU is ready to negotiate a treaty in the framework of the WHO”, he said.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus welcomed the commitment to support and strengthen the global health architecture for a better response and to enhance preparedness for future pandemics. The WHO is ready to explore all possible avenues, including an international treaty, he said.
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte announced his country’s additional contribution of €52 million to ACT-A and €10 million to the Global Financing Facility.
The President of the European Parliament, David Sassoli, has been a vocal advocate of multilateralism.
“We need to explore coordinated multilateral solutions that consider not only voluntary sharing of production licences—an effective tool to enhance production—but also mandatory forms of licence sharing in the context of an emergency situation such as the current one. The entire international community has a shared responsibility. That is why we support the call to negotiate a new global treaty to strengthen the common surveillance and response system for epidemics”.
See the Rome Declaration: https://bit.ly/2QCJzxU (Original version in French by Aminata Niang and Agathe Cherki)