Week 3: What’s happening in the world of the vaccine?
Senator Warren and Representative Schakowsky announce the COVID-19 Emergency Manufacturing Act, proposing urgently needed action to ensure affordable access to drugs, medical devices, and PPE.
On April 30th, Senator Warren and Representative Schakowsky announced the COVID-19 Emergency Manufacturing Act, which would require the U.S. government to begin manufacturing personal protective equipment, diagnostics and drugs in shortage, in addition to requiring the construction of manufacturing facilities for vaccines. The bill, which builds on earlier proposals by the two congresswomen, is a necessary step to ensure that the nation’s healthcare system can meet the challenge of the pandemic, and that the vaccine will be produced at the scale of public health need. As Data for Progress reported last year, voters largely support government manufacturing of drugs. Let’s hope the bill finds support in Congress too.
Public support for government manufacturing of prescription drugs.
A few days after the adoption of the UN resolution we shared last week, the World Health Organization launched the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator, with the stated goal of ensuring that low-income and high-income countries alike will have access to the products of COVID-19 research. Unfortunately, the project has not committed to an open innovation platform or an alternative approach to intellectual property, which would be meaningful steps to make sure everyone can afford vaccines and treatment. It’s also unclear to what extent the voluntary pool we wrote positively about last week could be incorporated into this project. We’ll keep you updated as we receive more news!
Partners in the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator.
