Access to health products

Definition

Access to health prod­ucts is a human right, intrin­si­cally linked with the right to health. Under the right to health frame­work, health prod­ucts must be avail­able, acces­si­ble, accept­able, and of good qual­ity. This right cov­ers small mol­e­cule drugs, bio­log­ics, vac­cines, diag­nos­tics, and other types of health tools such as gene- and cell-ther­a­pies. While some prece­dents men­tion access to “essen­tial med­i­cines,” this right includes health prod­ucts beyond those for­mally rec­og­nized in the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion (WHO) list of essen­tial med­i­cines. It also cov­ers access across dis­eases, includ­ing HIV, malaria, tuber­cu­lo­sis, other infec­tious dis­eases, and non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases. The right to access cov­ers prod­ucts indi­cated for pre­ven­tive and pro­phy­laxis health­care. Access to health prod­ucts must be guar­an­teed dur­ing and also in the absence of emer­gen­cies.

Access to HIV treat­ments and other health prod­ucts con­tin­ues to be dis­turbingly uneven in many places, with poorer health out­comes for women and girls, chil­dren, minori­ties, indige­nous pop­u­la­tions, per­sons liv­ing in poverty, queer peo­ple, per­sons with dis­abil­ity, migrants, state­less per­sons, and oth­ers expe­ri­enc­ing mar­gin­al­iza­tion. Improv­ing access to health prod­ucts could save mil­lions of lives every year. Intel­lec­tual prop­erty is often rec­og­nized as a crit­i­cal legal bar­rier imped­ing the generic man­u­fac­ture of health prod­ucts, lead­ing to lack of access and exces­sive pric­ing.

The Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health and sev­eral other sub­se­quent prece­dents have rec­og­nized that the TRIPS agree­ment should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right to pro­tect pub­lic health, in par­tic­u­lar to pro­mote access to health prod­ucts for all. Many of the prece­dents reflected under the term access to health prod­ucts reaf­firm the right to pro­tect pub­lic health over intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights, includ­ing by mak­ing full use of the flex­i­bil­i­ties under the TRIPS agree­ment and other inter­na­tional com­mit­ments. Nev­er­the­less, these recog­ni­tions should only be con­sid­ered as a base­line and not a ceil­ing.

Other pol­icy inter­ven­tions required under a right to health frame­work to ensure access to health prod­ucts include facil­i­tat­ing tech­nol­ogy trans­fer, enhanc­ing local and regional man­u­fac­tur­ing capa­bil­i­ties, ring fenc­ing domes­tic resource allo­ca­tion, and explor­ing and imple­ment­ing alter­na­tive incen­tives for encour­ag­ing research and devel­op­ment. An increas­ing num­ber of prece­dents are rec­og­niz­ing the need for these pol­icy inter­ven­tions to pro­tect the right to health, and they are reflected in this Lan­guage Com­pendium under the access to health prod­ucts term and also under alter­na­tive R&D mod­els, local and regional man­u­fac­ture, and tech­nol­ogy trans­fer.

Precedents

2022 Resolution on industrial development cooperation

• “Encour­ages the pro­mo­tion of South-South coop­er­a­tion, tri­an­gu­lar coop­er­a­tion and the trans­fer, dif­fu­sion and adop­tion of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms in build­ing their engage­ment in inter­na­tional trade through the devel­op­ment of micro-, small and medium-sized enter­prises” (p. 10)

• “Stress­ing also that the cre­ation, devel­op­ment and dif­fu­sion of new inno­va­tions and tech­nolo­gies and asso­ci­ated know-how, includ­ing the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms, are pow­er­ful dri­vers of eco­nomic growth and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment” (p. 5)

• “Encour­ages regional, sub­re­gional and inter­re­gional coop­er­a­tion as a plat­form for inter­na­tional indus­trial coop­er­a­tion aim­ing to pro­mote invest­ments and tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on mutu­ally agreed terms, to dis­sem­i­nate inclu­sive and equi­table poli­cies and prac­tices, as well as to fos­ter oppor­tu­ni­ties for high qual­ity and decent work, includ­ing for youth and women” (p. 9)

2022 Resolution on elevating pandemic prevention, preparedness and response to the highest level of political leadership

• “Rec­og­niz­ing the need to sup­port devel­op­ing coun­tries in build­ing exper­tise and in devel­op­ing local and regional man­u­fac­tur­ing capac­i­ties for tools, includ­ing by build­ing on efforts under the COVID-19 Vac­cine Global Access (COVAX) Facil­ity, with a view to devel­op­ing improved global, regional and local man­u­fac­tur­ing, han­dling and dis­tri­bu­tion capac­i­ties while fur­ther enabling the increased use of health tech­nolo­gies and the dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion of health sys­tems” (p. 3)

• “Empha­siz­ing the need to improve access to qual­ity, safe, effec­tive and afford­able vac­cines, ther­a­peu­tics, diag­nos­tics and other health tech­nolo­gies, inter alia, through build­ing capac­ity for local and regional pro­duc­tion, espe­cially in low- and mid­dle-income coun­tries, tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on mutu­ally agreed terms, coop­er­a­tion with, sup­port to and the devel­op­ment of vol­un­tary patent pools and other vol­un­tary ini­tia­tives, such as the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion COVID-19 Tech­nol­ogy Access Pool and the Med­i­cines Patent Pool, and pro­mot­ing generic com­pe­ti­tion in line with the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion road map for access to med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts, 2019–2023” (p. 4)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to pro­mote the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy and know-how and encour­age research, inno­va­tion and com­mit­ments to vol­un­tary licens­ing, where pos­si­ble, in agree­ments where pub­lic fund­ing has been invested in research and devel­op­ment for pan­demic pre­ven­tion, pre­pared­ness and response, to strengthen local and regional capac­i­ties for the man­u­fac­tur­ing, reg­u­la­tion and pro­cure­ment of needed tools for equi­table and effec­tive access to vac­cines, ther­a­peu­tics, diag­nos­tics and essen­tial sup­plies, as well as for clin­i­cal tri­als, and to increase global sup­ply through facil­i­tat­ing trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy within the frame­work of rel­e­vant mul­ti­lat­eral agree­ments” (p. 6)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to pro­mote the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy and know-how and encour­age research, inno­va­tion and com­mit­ments to vol­un­tary licens­ing, where pos­si­ble, in agree­ments where pub­lic fund­ing has been invested in research and devel­op­ment for pan­demic pre­ven­tion, pre­pared­ness and response, to strengthen local and regional capac­i­ties for the man­u­fac­tur­ing, reg­u­la­tion and pro­cure­ment of needed tools for equi­table and effec­tive access to vac­cines, ther­a­peu­tics, diag­nos­tics and essen­tial sup­plies, as well as for clin­i­cal tri­als, and to increase global sup­ply through facil­i­tat­ing trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy within the frame­work of rel­e­vant mul­ti­lat­eral agree­ments” (p. 6)

2022 HRC Res­o­lu­tion on access to medicines, vaccines and other health products

• “Reaf­firm­ing the impor­tance of improv­ing the trans­parency of mar­kets, costs and sup­ply chains for med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts across the whole value chain, and tak­ing into con­sid­er­a­tion res­o­lu­tion WHA72.8 of 28 May 2019, adopted by the World Health Assem­bly at its sev­enty-sec­ond ses­sion” (p. 3)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing also the need for States, in coop­er­a­tion with regional and inter­na­tional orga­ni­za­tions and civil soci­ety, includ­ing non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, phil­an­thropic foun­da­tions, aca­d­e­mic and research insti­tu­tions and the pri­vate sec­tor, involved at all stages of the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals value chain, includ­ing research and devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­ture, dis­tri­bu­tion and sup­ply of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal prod­ucts, to cre­ate favourable con­di­tions at the national, regional and inter­na­tional lev­els to ensure the full and equal enjoy­ment of the right of every­one to the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health” (p. 4)

• “Seri­ously con­cerned also that the sup­ply of health prod­ucts and tech­nolo­gies is depen­dent on man­u­fac­tur­ing facil­i­ties con­cen­trated in few coun­tries and that the lack of ade­quate infra­struc­ture and logis­tics exper­tise to store, dis­trib­ute and deliver diag­nos­tics, med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts and tech­nolo­gies, par­tic­u­larly in devel­op­ing coun­tries, among other fac­tors, ham­pers efforts to achieve diag­no­sis, treat­ment and vac­ci­na­tion tar­gets for sev­eral dis­eases, at the right time, safely and effi­ciently, espe­cially in the con­text of health emer­gen­cies” (p. 4)

• “Deeply con­cerned about the loss of lives and liveli­hoods and the dis­rup­tion to economies and soci­eties caused by the COVID-19 pan­demic, and its neg­a­tive impact on the enjoy­ment of human rights around the world, par­tic­u­larly for women and girls, and rec­og­niz­ing that the COVID-19 pan­demic has high­lighted the crit­i­cal need to pre­vent and pre­pare for poten­tial dis­rup­tions of the sup­ply chain for essen­tial med­i­cines and other health tech­nolo­gies, includ­ing through the strength­en­ing of local pro­duc­tion, and there­fore wel­com­ing res­o­lu­tion WHA74.6 of 31 May 2021, adopted by the World Health Assem­bly at its sev­enty-fourth ses­sion, on strength­en­ing local pro­duc­tion of med­i­cines and other health tech­nolo­gies to improve access” (p. 5)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing the need to appro­pri­ately address chal­lenges, gaps, mar­ket fail­ures and oppor­tu­ni­ties regard­ing the research and devel­op­ment of health tech­nolo­gies, avail­abil­ity and afford­abil­ity to treat, inter alia, rare and neglected dis­eases, as well as infec­tious dis­eases, and to respond to the growth of emerg­ing chal­lenges, such as antimi­cro­bial resis­tance and pathogens with pan­demic poten­tial, among oth­ers, with a view to ade­quately address­ing pub­lic health needs and pro­tect­ing, respect­ing and ful­fill­ing human rights, and tak­ing into account the neces­sity to pro­mote frame­works that meet pub­lic health needs, while ade­quately reward­ing inno­va­tion” (p. 5)

• “

  Urges States and all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers, in order to ensure timely, equi­table and unhin­dered access for all per­sons to safe, afford­able, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines, vac­cines, diag­nos­tics and ther­a­peu­tics, and other health prod­ucts and tech­nolo­gies with a view to advanc­ing the real­iza­tion of the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals:

  (a) To pro­mote research and capac­ity-build­ing ini­tia­tives, and to enhance inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion on and access to sci­ence, inno­va­tion, tech­nolo­gies, tech­ni­cal assis­tance and knowl­edge-shar­ing, includ­ing by pool­ing ini­tia­tives, while appre­ci­at­ing the sub­stan­tive efforts many States have already made to this end;

  (b) To take all mea­sures nec­es­sary to strengthen regional and local pro­duc­tion, by pro­mot­ing inno­v­a­tive modal­i­ties of global part­ner­ships and tech­nol­ogy trans­fers, on mutu­ally agreed terms, and to facil­i­tate trade in med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts;

  (c) To share data and results in accor­dance with inter­na­tion­ally agreed prin­ci­ples, includ­ing shar­ing of pathogens, sam­ples and genetic sequenc­ing data, and ensure the fair and equi­table shar­ing of ben­e­fits that arise from their uti­liza­tion, in accor­dance with inter­na­tional access and ben­e­fit-shar­ing instru­ments;

  (d) To pro­mote the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy and know-how on mutu­ally agreed terms, and to encour­age research, inno­va­tion and com­mit­ment, where pos­si­ble, to vol­un­tary licens­ing in all agree­ments in which pub­lic fund­ing has been invested in research and devel­op­ment;

  (e) To assist in efforts to build capac­ity through train­ing and finan­cial sup­port for devel­op­ing coun­tries to pro­duce health tech­nolo­gies, includ­ing mRNA vac­cine tech­nol­ogy;

  (f) To explore ways to pro­mote equi­table access and fair dis­tri­bu­tion of health prod­ucts, includ­ing the pos­si­ble estab­lish­ment of a global end-to-end plat­form;

  (g) To advance the health and care work­force invest­ment agenda, with a spe­cial focus on the pri­mary health-care work­force and employ­ment of women at all lev­els;

  (h) To take mea­sures to ensure acces­si­ble and afford­able access to health-care sys­tems for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;

  ” (p. 7)

• “Reit­er­ates the call upon States to con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate, as appro­pri­ate, on mod­els and approaches that sup­port the delink­age of the cost of new research and devel­op­ment from the prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines and diag­nos­tics for dis­eases that pre­dom­i­nantly affect devel­op­ing coun­tries, includ­ing emerg­ing and neglected trop­i­cal dis­eases, so as to ensure their sus­tained acces­si­bil­ity, afford­abil­ity and avail­abil­ity and to ensure access to treat­ment for all those in need” (p. 7)

• “Rec­og­nizes the inno­v­a­tive fund­ing mech­a­nisms and arrange­ments that con­trib­ute to the avail­abil­ity of vac­cines and med­i­cines in devel­op­ing coun­tries, such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuber­cu­lo­sis and Malaria, the Gavi Alliance, Uni­taid, the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accel­er­a­tor ini­tia­tive and the COVID-19 Tech­nol­ogy Access Pool (C-TAP), espe­cially for those liv­ing in poverty, chil­dren and other per­sons in vul­ner­a­ble sit­u­a­tions, and calls upon all States, United Nations agen­cies, funds and pro­grammes, in par­tic­u­lar the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion, and rel­e­vant inter­gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, within their respec­tive man­dates, and encour­ages rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers, includ­ing com­pa­nies involved in the research and devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­ture, import­ing, dis­tri­bu­tion and sup­ply of phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, while safe­guard­ing pub­lic health from undue influ­ence by any form of real, per­ceived or poten­tial con­flict of inter­est, to fur­ther col­lab­o­rate to enable equi­table access to qual­ity, safe and effec­tive med­i­cines and vac­cines that are afford­able to all, includ­ing those liv­ing in poverty, chil­dren and other per­sons in vul­ner­a­ble sit­u­a­tions” (p. 8)

• “Urges all States, United Nations agen­cies, funds and pro­grammes, and rel­e­vant inter­gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, espe­cially the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion, within their respec­tive man­dates, and encour­ages non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions and rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers, includ­ing phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies, to pro­mote inno­v­a­tive research and devel­op­ment to address health needs in devel­op­ing coun­tries, includ­ing access to safe, effec­tive, qual­ity and afford­able med­i­cines and vac­cines, in par­tic­u­lar with regard to dis­eases dis­pro­por­tion­ately affect­ing devel­op­ing coun­tries, and the chal­lenges aris­ing from the grow­ing bur­den of non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases, while tak­ing into account the Global Strat­egy and Plan of Action on Pub­lic Health, Inno­va­tion and Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty of the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion” (p. 9)

2022 HRC Res­o­lu­tion on ensuring equitable, affordable, timely and universal access for all countries to vaccines in response to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

• “Stress­ing the impor­tance of improv­ing the trans­parency of mar­kets for med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts across the whole value chain, and tak­ing note of World Health Assem­bly res­o­lu­tion WHA72.8 of 28 May 2019” (p. 4)

• “Encour­ages States to work in part­ner­ship with all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to increase research and devel­op­ment fund­ing for vac­cines and med­i­cines, lever­age dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies and strengthen the sci­en­tific inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion nec­es­sary to com­bat COVID-19 and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards the fur­ther devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of diag­nos­tics, antivi­ral med­i­cines, per­sonal pro­tec­tive equip­ment and vac­cines while adher­ing to the objec­tives of qual­ity, effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity and afford­abil­ity” (p. 5)

• “Reaf­firms the right of States to use the pro­vi­sions of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment) and the flex­i­bil­i­ties therein, as reaf­firmed in the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, in which it is rec­og­nized that the agree­ment should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of States to pro­tect pub­lic health, in par­tic­u­lar to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, to facil­i­tate access for all to COVID-19 vac­cines and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards the rapid devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of vac­cines while adher­ing to the objec­tives of trans­parency, effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity and afford­abil­ity” (p. 5)

• “Calls upon States and all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to pro­mote research and capac­ity-build­ing ini­tia­tives and to enhance coop­er­a­tion on and access to sci­ence, inno­va­tion, tech­nolo­gies, tech­ni­cal assis­tance and knowl­edge-shar­ing, to ensure uni­ver­sal, equi­table and afford­able access for all per­sons to COVID-19 vac­cines, includ­ing through improved coor­di­na­tion among mech­a­nisms, espe­cially with devel­op­ing coun­tries, in a col­lab­o­ra­tive, coor­di­nated and trans­par­ent man­ner and on mutu­ally agreed terms, in response to the COVID-19 pan­demic and towards advanc­ing the real­iza­tion of the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals” (p. 5)

• “Reit­er­ates the call for States to con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate, as appro­pri­ate, on mod­els and approaches that sup­port the delink­ing of the cost of new research and devel­op­ment from the prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines and diag­nos­tics for dis­eases, to ensure their sus­tained acces­si­bil­ity, afford­abil­ity and avail­abil­ity and to sup­port access to treat­ment for all those in need” (p. 5)

• “Encour­ages States and other stake­hold­ers to vol­un­tar­ily share tech­nol­ogy and sup­port the devel­op­ment of vol­un­tary patent pools, such as the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion COVID-19 Tech­nol­ogy Access Pool (C-TAP)” (p. 6)

2022 WTO Ministerial Decision on the TRIPS Agreement

• “Notwith­stand­ing the pro­vi­sion of patent rights under its domes­tic leg­is­la­tion, an eli­gi­ble Mem­ber may limit the rights pro­vided for under Arti­cle 28.1 of the TRIPS Agree­ment (here­inafter “the Agree­ment”) by autho­riz­ing the use of the sub­ject mat­ter of a patent required for the pro­duc­tion and sup­ply of COVID-19 vac­cines with­out the con­sent of the right holder to the extent nec­es­sary to address the COVID-19 pan­demic, in accor­dance with the pro­vi­sions of Arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment, as clar­i­fied and waived in para­graphs 2 to 6 below.” (para­graph 1)

• “For greater clar­ity, an eli­gi­ble Mem­ber may autho­rize the use of the sub­ject mat­ter of a patent under Arti­cle 31 with­out the right holder’s con­sent through any instru­ment avail­able in the law of the Mem­ber such as exec­u­tive orders, emer­gency decrees, gov­ern­ment use autho­riza­tions, and judi­cial or admin­is­tra­tive orders, whether or not a Mem­ber has a com­pul­sory license regime in place.” (para­graph 2)

• “An eli­gi­ble Mem­ber may waive the require­ment of Arti­cle 31(f) that autho­rized use under Arti­cle 31 be pre­dom­i­nantly to sup­ply its domes­tic mar­ket and may allow any pro­por­tion of the prod­ucts man­u­fac­tured under the autho­riza­tion in accor­dance with this Deci­sion to be exported to eli­gi­ble Mem­bers, includ­ing through inter­na­tional or regional joint ini­tia­tives that aim to ensure the equi­table access of eli­gi­ble Mem­bers to the COVID-19 vac­cine cov­ered by the autho­riza­tion.” (para­graph 3(b))

• “No later than six months from the date of this Deci­sion, Mem­bers will decide on its exten­sion to cover the pro­duc­tion and sup­ply of COVID-19 diag­nos­tics and ther­a­peu­tics.” (para­graph 8)

2021 HRC Res­o­lu­tion on ensuring equitable, affordable, timely and universal access for all countries to vaccines in response to COVID-19

• “Rec­og­niz­ing fur­ther that uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age implies that all peo­ple have access with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion to nation­ally deter­mined sets of needed pro­mo­tive, pre­ven­tive, cura­tive, pal­lia­tive and reha­bil­i­ta­tive essen­tial health-care ser­vices and essen­tial, safe, afford­able, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines and vac­cines, while ensur­ing that the use of these ser­vices does not expose users to finan­cial hard­ship, with spe­cial empha­sis on the poor, vul­ner­a­ble and mar­gin­al­ized seg­ments of the pop­u­la­tion” (p. 2)

• “Stress­ing the impor­tance of improv­ing the trans­parency of mar­kets for med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts across the whole value chain, and tak­ing note of World Health Assem­bly res­o­lu­tion WHA72.8 of 28 May 2019” (p. 2)

• “Empha­sizes the urgent need to ensure the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health and to facil­i­tate the devel­op­ment of robust health sys­tems and uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age, encom­pass­ing uni­ver­sal, timely and equi­table access to all essen­tial health tech­nolo­gies, diag­nos­tics, ther­a­peu­tics, med­i­cines and vac­cines in response to the COVID-19 pan­demic and other health emer­gen­cies, in order to ensure full access to immu­niza­tion for all, in par­tic­u­lar per­sons and groups in vul­ner­a­ble sit­u­a­tions, as a mat­ter of global pri­or­ity for all States” (p. 4)

• “Encour­ages States to work in part­ner­ship with all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to increase research and devel­op­ment fund­ing for vac­cines and med­i­cines, lever­age dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies and strengthen the sci­en­tific inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion nec­es­sary to com­bat COVID-19 and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards the fur­ther devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of diag­nos­tics, antivi­ral med­i­cines, per­sonal pro­tec­tive equip­ment and vac­cines while adher­ing to the objec­tives of qual­ity, effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity and afford­abil­ity” (p. 4)

• “Requests all States, inter­na­tional orga­ni­za­tions and rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to com­mit to trans­parency in all mat­ters relat­ing to the pro­duc­tion, dis­tri­bu­tion and fair pric­ing of vac­cines, in accor­dance with national and regional legal frame­works, and urges States to take imme­di­ate steps to pre­vent spec­u­la­tion and undue export con­trols and stock­pil­ing that may hin­der afford­able, timely, equi­table and uni­ver­sal access for all coun­tries to COVID-19 vac­cines” (p. 5)

• “Reit­er­ates the call for States to con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate, as appro­pri­ate, on mod­els and approaches that sup­port the delink­ing of the cost of new research and devel­op­ment from the prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines and diag­nos­tics for dis­eases, to ensure their sus­tained acces­si­bil­ity, afford­abil­ity and avail­abil­ity and to sup­port access to treat­ment for all those in need” (p. 5)

• “Calls upon States and all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to pro­mote research and capac­ity-build­ing ini­tia­tives, and to enhance coop­er­a­tion on and access to sci­ence, inno­va­tion, tech­nolo­gies, tech­ni­cal assis­tance and knowl­edge-shar­ing, to ensure uni­ver­sal, equi­table and afford­able access for all per­sons to COVID-19 vac­cines, includ­ing through improved coor­di­na­tion among mech­a­nisms, espe­cially with devel­op­ing coun­tries, in a col­lab­o­ra­tive, coor­di­nated and trans­par­ent man­ner and on mutu­ally agreed terms, in response to the COVID-19 pan­demic and towards advanc­ing the real­iza­tion of the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals” (p. 5)

• “Reaf­firms the right of States to use the pro­vi­sions of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment) and the flex­i­bil­i­ties therein, as reaf­firmed in the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, in which it is rec­og­nized that the agree­ment should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of States to pro­tect pub­lic health, in par­tic­u­lar to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, to facil­i­tate access for all to COVID-19 vac­cines and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards the rapid devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of vac­cines, while adher­ing to the objec­tives of trans­parency, effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity and afford­abil­ity” (p. 5)

2021 Resolution on science, technology and innovation for sustainable development

• “Reaf­firm­ing that the cre­ation, devel­op­ment and dif­fu­sion of new inno­va­tions and tech­nolo­gies and asso­ci­ated know-how, includ­ing the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms, are pow­er­ful dri­vers of eco­nomic growth and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment” (p. 3)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing also the impor­tance of sup­port­ing poli­cies and activ­i­ties of devel­op­ing coun­tries in the fields of sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy and inno­va­tion through North-South, South-South and tri­an­gu­lar coop­er­a­tion in the areas of finan­cial and tech­ni­cal assis­tance, capac­ity-build­ing and tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on mutu­ally agreed terms” (p. 4)

• “Under­scores the need to adopt sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy and inno­va­tion strate­gies as inte­gral ele­ments of national sus­tain­able devel­op­ment plans and strate­gies that help to strengthen knowl­edge-shar­ing on mutu­ally agreed terms and col­lab­o­ra­tion and scale up invest­ment in sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy, engi­neer­ing and math­e­mat­ics edu­ca­tion, and enhance tech­ni­cal, voca­tional and ter­tiary edu­ca­tion and train­ing” (p. 6)

• “Also encour­ages Mem­ber States to pro­mote local inno­va­tion capa­bil­i­ties for inclu­sive and sus­tain­able eco­nomic devel­op­ment by bring­ing together local sci­en­tific, voca­tional and engi­neer­ing knowl­edge, mobi­liz­ing resources from mul­ti­ple chan­nels, improv­ing infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nol­ogy and sup­port­ing infra­struc­ture devel­op­ment” (p. 7)

2021 HRC Res­o­lu­tion on the human rights of migrants

• “Also calls upon all States to pro­mote and pro­tect the right of every­one, with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion of any kind, to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health, and encour­ages them to pro­mote equi­table access to health ser­vices, dis­ease pre­ven­tion and care for migrants, includ­ing equi­table access for all migrants to COVID-19 diag­nos­tics, treat­ment and vac­cines” (p. 4)

2021 Resolution on ensuring equitable, affordable, timely and universal access for all countries to vaccines in response to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

• “Rec­og­niz­ing that the COVID-19 pan­demic requires a global response that is peo­ple-cen­tred, gen­der-respon­sive, with full respect for human rights, mul­ti­di­men­sional, coor­di­nated, inclu­sive and inno­v­a­tive, based on unity, sol­i­dar­ity and mul­ti­lat­eral coop­er­a­tion, to ensure that all States, in par­tic­u­lar devel­op­ing States, includ­ing the least devel­oped coun­tries, have unhin­dered, timely, fair and equi­table access to safe diag­nos­tics, ther­a­peu­tics, med­i­cines, vac­cines and essen­tial health tech­nolo­gies and their com­po­nents, as well as equip­ment, bear­ing in mind that immu­niza­tion against COVID-19 is a global pub­lic good for health in pre­vent­ing, con­tain­ing and stop­ping trans­mis­sion, and in bring­ing the pan­demic to an end” (p. 5)

• “Encour­ages States to work in part­ner­ship with all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to increase research and devel­op­ment fund­ing for vac­cines, med­i­cines, ther­a­peu­tics and diag­nos­tics, lever­age dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies and strengthen the sci­en­tific inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion nec­es­sary to com­bat COVID-19 and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards the fur­ther devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of diag­nos­tics, antivi­ral med­i­cines, ther­a­peu­tics, per­sonal pro­tec­tive equip­ment and vac­cines while adher­ing to the objec­tives of qual­ity, effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity and afford­abil­ity” (p. 6)

• “Urges States to facil­i­tate the trade in, acqui­si­tion of, access to and dis­tri­bu­tion of COVID-19 vac­cines as a cru­cial ele­ment of their responses to the pan­demic, to ensure the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health and to sup­port the admin­is­tra­tion of vac­cines to address the pan­demic, in line with the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals and in accor­dance with the rel­e­vant inter­na­tional legal frame­works, includ­ing inter­na­tional human rights oblig­a­tions, tak­ing into account the prin­ci­ples of non-dis­crim­i­na­tion and trans­parency” (p. 6)

• “Reit­er­ates the call for States to con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate, as appro­pri­ate, on mod­els and approaches that sup­port the delink­ing of the cost of new research and devel­op­ment from the prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines and diag­nos­tics for dis­eases, to ensure their sus­tained acces­si­bil­ity, afford­abil­ity and avail­abil­ity and to sup­port access to treat­ment for all those in need” (p. 6)

2021 WHA Resolution on Strengthening Local Production to Improve Access

• “Urges Mem­ber States, where appro­pri­ate, based on the national con­text: to apply a holis­tic approach in strength­en­ing local pro­duc­tion by con­sid­er­ing, for exam­ple, pro­mot­ing research and devel­op­ment, trans­parency of mar­kets for med­i­cines and other health tech­nolo­gies, reg­u­la­tory sys­tems strength­en­ing, access to sus­tain­able and afford­able financ­ing, devel­op­ment of skilled human resources, access to tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on vol­un­tary and mutu­ally agreed terms for pro­duc­tion and needs-based inno­va­tion, the aggre­ga­tion of national and regional demand, and appro­pri­ate incen­tives for pri­vate-sec­tor invest­ment, par­tic­u­larly in the con­text of achiev­ing uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age.” (para­graph 1(5))

• “Urges Mem­ber States, where appro­pri­ate, based on the national con­text: to engage in global, regional and sub­re­gional net­works related to pro­mot­ing sus­tain­able local pro­duc­tion of qual­ity, safe, effec­tive and afford­able med­i­cines, and to fur­ther enhance mul­ti­stake­holder col­lab­o­ra­tion.” (para­graph 1(6))

• “Urges Mem­ber States, where appro­pri­ate, based on the national con­text: to fur­ther engage in North–South and South–South devel­op­ment coop­er­a­tion, part­ner­ships and net­works to build and improve the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy related to health inno­va­tion on vol­un­tary and mutu­ally agreed terms and in line with their inter­na­tional oblig­a­tions.” (para­graph 1(7))

• “Urges Mem­ber States, where appro­pri­ate, based on the national con­text: to take into account the rights and oblig­a­tions in the Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), includ­ing those affirmed by the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, in order to pro­mote access to med­i­cines and other health tech­nolo­gies for all.” (para­graph 1(8))

2021 Political declaration on equitable global access to COVID-19 vaccines

• “We call for the rapid scal­ing up and expan­sion of vac­cine pro­duc­tion glob­ally, includ­ing in devel­op­ing coun­tries, through appro­pri­ate dis­sem­i­na­tion of tech­nol­ogy and know-how, e.g., licens­ing in accor­dance with World Trade Orga­ni­za­tions rules, using TRIPS flex­i­bil­i­ties if nec­es­sary, shar­ing knowl­edges, and data related to COVID-19 health tech­nolo­gies.” (para­graph 18)

2021 UNESC Resolution on UNAIDS

• “Calls for urgent action and part­ner­ship by Mem­ber States, the United Nations sys­tem, civil soci­ety, local com­mu­ni­ties, the pri­vate sec­tor and other stake­hold­ers to scale up evi­dence-based HIV pre­ven­tion, test­ing, treat­ment, care and reten­tion ser­vices, includ­ing access to safe, effec­tive, qual­ity and afford­able med­i­cines, includ­ing gener­ics, to ensure that those ser­vices reach the peo­ple who need them the most, includ­ing ado­les­cent girls and young women as well as key pop­u­la­tions that epi­demi­o­log­i­cal evi­dence shows to be glob­ally at higher risk of HIV infec­tion, and chil­dren liv­ing with HIV, who have poorer HIV treat­ment cov­er­age than adults and com­prise a higher rel­a­tive pro­por­tion of AIDS-related deaths.” (para­graph 4)

• “Urges Mem­ber States to urgently remove, where fea­si­ble, obsta­cles that limit the capac­ity of low- and mid­dle-income coun­tries to pro­vide afford­able and effec­tive HIV pre­ven­tion and treat­ment prod­ucts, diag­nos­tics, med­i­cines and com­modi­ties and other phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal prod­ucts.” (para­graph 5)

2021 Political declaration on HIV and AIDS

• “Reaf­firm that access to safe, effec­tive, equi­table and afford­able med­i­cines and com­modi­ties for all, with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion, is fun­da­men­tal to the full real­iza­tion of the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health, yet note with grave con­cern the high num­ber of peo­ple with­out access to med­i­cine and that the sus­tain­abil­ity of pro­vid­ing life­long safe, effec­tive and afford­able HIV treat­ment con­tin­ues to be threat­ened by fac­tors such as poverty and under­score that access to med­i­cines would save mil­lions of lives.” (para­graph 42)

2021 CSW Report on women and HIV/AIDS

• “The Com­mis­sion may wish to encour­age the United Nations sys­tem and other inter­na­tional actors to advo­cate for the removal of obsta­cles that limit the capac­ity of low-and mid­dle-income coun­tries to pro­vide afford­able and effec­tive HIV pre­ven­tion and treat­ment prod­ucts, diag­nos­tics, com­modi­ties and other phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal prod­ucts tai­lored to or that are more appro­pri­ate for women and to sup­port access to safe, effec­tive, qual­ity and afford­able med­i­cines, includ­ing gener­ics, to ensure that they reach the peo­ple who need them the most, espe­cially ado­les­cent girls and young women.” (para­graph 58(e))

2021 HRC resolution on human rights in the context of HIV and AIDS

• “Urges States to bring their laws, poli­cies and prac­tices, includ­ing their strate­gies for imple­ment­ing the HIV- and other health-related Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals, fully into com­pli­ance with their oblig­a­tions under inter­na­tional human rights law, and to review or repeal those that are dis­crim­i­na­tory or that adversely affect the suc­cess­ful, effec­tive and equi­table deliv­ery of, and access to, HIV pre­ven­tion, diag­no­sis, treat­ment, care and sup­port pro­grammes for all per­sons liv­ing with, pre­sumed to be liv­ing with, at risk of or affected by HIV, includ­ing key pop­u­la­tions.” (para­graph 7)

2020 Resolution on international cooperation to ensure global access to medicines, vaccines and medical equipment to face COVID-19

• “Encour­ages Mem­ber States to work in part­ner­ship with all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to increase research and devel­op­ment fund­ing for vac­cines and med­i­cines, lever­age dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies, and strengthen sci­en­tific inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion nec­es­sary to com­bat COVID-19 and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards rapid devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of diag­nos­tics, antivi­ral med­i­cines, per­sonal pro­tec­tive equip­ment and vac­cines, adher­ing to the objec­tives of effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity, and afford­abil­ity” (page)

2020 Resolution on consolidating gains and accelerating efforts to control and eliminate malaria in developing countries, particularly in Africa, by 2030

• “Reaf­firms the right to use, to the fullest extent, the pro­vi­sions con­tained in the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, the deci­sion of the Gen­eral Coun­cil of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion of 30 August 2003 on the imple­men­ta­tion of para­graph 6 of the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, and the lat­est amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the TRIPS Agree­ment, which came into effect in Jan­u­ary 2017, which pro­vides flex­i­bil­i­ties for the pro­tec­tion of pub­lic health, and in par­tic­u­lar to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all and to encour­age the pro­vi­sion of assis­tance to devel­op­ing coun­tries in this regard, and calls for the broad and timely accep­tance of the amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment, as pro­posed by the Gen­eral Coun­cil of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion in its deci­sion of 6 Decem­ber 2005, while rec­og­niz­ing that the pro­tec­tion of intel­lec­tual prop­erty is impor­tant for the devel­op­ment of new med­i­cine” (p. 10)

• “Calls upon the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity to sup­port ways to expand access to afford­able, effec­tive and safe prod­ucts and treat­ments, such as vec­tor con­trol mea­sures, includ­ing indoor resid­ual spray­ing, long-last­ing insec­ti­ci­dal nets, includ­ing through the free dis­tri­bu­tion of such nets, ade­quate diag­nos­tic facil­i­ties, inter­mit­tent pre­ven­tive ther­a­pies for preg­nant women, chil­dren under 5 and infants, and artemisinin-based com­bi­na­tion ther­apy for pop­u­la­tions at risk of fal­ci­parum malaria infec­tion in endemic coun­tries, par­tic­u­larly in Africa, includ­ing through addi­tional funds and inno­v­a­tive mech­a­nisms, inter alia, for the financ­ing and scal­ing up of artemisinin pro­duc­tion and pro­cure­ment, as appro­pri­ate, to meet the increased need” (p. 11)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to pro­mote access to med­i­cines, and empha­sizes that access to afford­able and qual­ity med­i­cines and med­ical care in the event of sick­ness, as well as in the pre­ven­tion, treat­ment and con­trol of dis­eases, is cen­tral to the real­iza­tion of the right to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health” (p. 9)

2020 Resolution on comprehensive and coordinated response to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States and all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to pro­mote research and capac­ity-build­ing ini­tia­tives, as well as to enhance coop­er­a­tion on and access to sci­ence, inno­va­tion, tech­nolo­gies, tech­ni­cal assis­tance and knowl­edge- shar­ing, includ­ing through improved coor­di­na­tion among exist­ing mech­a­nisms, espe­cially with devel­op­ing coun­tries, in a col­lab­o­ra­tive, coor­di­nated and trans­par­ent man­ner and on mutu­ally agreed terms in response to the COVID-19 pan­demic and towards advanc­ing the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals” (p. 11)

• “Encour­ages Mem­ber States to work in part­ner­ship with all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to increase research and devel­op­ment fund­ing for vac­cines and med­i­cines, lever­age dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies, and strengthen sci­en­tific inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion nec­es­sary to com­bat COVID-19 and to bol­ster coor­di­na­tion, includ­ing with the pri­vate sec­tor, towards rapid devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­tur­ing and dis­tri­bu­tion of diag­nos­tics, ther­a­peu­tics, med­i­cines, includ­ing antivi­ral med­i­cines and med­ical sci­ence-based treat­ment pro­to­cols, and vac­cines, and per­sonal pro­tec­tive equip­ment, and explore ways to con­sider inte­grat­ing, as appro­pri­ate, safe and evi­dence-based tra­di­tional and com­ple­men­tary med­i­cine ser­vices, accord­ing to national con­text and pri­or­i­ties, adher­ing to the objec­tives of effi­cacy, safety, equity, acces­si­bil­ity, and afford­abil­ity, while tak­ing into account and sup­port­ing exist­ing mech­a­nisms, tools and ini­tia­tives, such as the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accel­er­a­tor, and rel­e­vant pledg­ing appeals” (p. 7)

• “Reaf­firms the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment) as amended, and also reaf­firms the 2001 World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of Mem­ber States to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and notes the need for appro­pri­ate incen­tives in the devel­op­ment of new health prod­ucts” (p. 7)

2020 Resolution on industrial development cooperation

• “Stress­ing also that the cre­ation, devel­op­ment and dif­fu­sion of new inno­va­tions and tech­nolo­gies and asso­ci­ated know-how, includ­ing the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms, are pow­er­ful dri­vers of eco­nomic growth and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment” (p. 4)

• “Encour­ages regional, sub­re­gional and inter­re­gional coop­er­a­tion as a plat­form for inter­na­tional indus­trial coop­er­a­tion aim­ing to pro­mote invest­ments and tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on mutu­ally agreed terms, to dis­sem­i­nate good poli­cies and prac­tices, as well as to fos­ter decent work, includ­ing for youth and women” (p. 8)

• “Encour­ages the pro­mo­tion of South-South coop­er­a­tion, tri­an­gu­lar coop­er­a­tion and the trans­fer, dif­fu­sion and adop­tion of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms in build­ing their engage­ment in inter­na­tional trade through the devel­op­ment of micro-, small and medium-sized enter­prises” (p. 9)

2020 Resolution on global health and foreign policy: strengthening health system resilience through affordable health care for all

• “Reaf­firm­ing the right to use, to the fullest extent the pro­vi­sions con­tained in the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), which pro­vides flex­i­bil­i­ties for the pro­tec­tion of pub­lic health and pro­motes access to med­i­cines for all, in par­tic­u­lar for devel­op­ing coun­tries, and the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty pro­tec­tion is impor­tant for the devel­op­ment of new med­i­cines and also rec­og­nizes the con­cerns about its effects on prices” (p. 5)

• “Reaf­firms the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment) as amended, and also reaf­firms the 2001 World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of Mem­ber States to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and notes the need for appro­pri­ate incen­tives in the devel­op­ment of new health prod­ucts” (p. 7)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to ensure access to med­i­cines as one of the fun­da­men­tal ele­ments of a robust health sys­tem based on uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age, and reaf­firms that States have the pri­mary role and respon­si­bil­ity to deter­mine and pro­mote their own path towards achiev­ing uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age that ensures uni­ver­sal and equi­table access to qual­ity essen­tial health ser­vices and access to safe, effec­tive, qual­ity and afford­able essen­tial med­i­cines, vac­cines, diag­nos­tics and other health tech­nolo­gies for all, with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion” (p. 7)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to enhance and build con­struc­tive engage­ment and stronger part­ner­ship with rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers from the pub­lic and pri­vate sec­tors, civil soci­ety and acad­e­mia to pur­sue access to uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age by improv­ing the avail­abil­ity, afford­abil­ity and effi­ciency of health prod­ucts through increas­ing trans­parency of prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines, med­ical devices, diag­nos­tics, assis­tive prod­ucts, cell- and gene-based ther­a­pies and other health tech­nolo­gies across the value chain, includ­ing through improved reg­u­la­tions, in accor­dance with national and regional legal frame­works and con­texts, to address the global con­cern about the high prices of some health prod­ucts, and in this regard encour­ages the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion to con­tinue its efforts to bien­ni­ally con­vene the Fair Pric­ing Forum with Mem­ber States and all rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to dis­cuss the afford­abil­ity and trans­parency of prices and costs relat­ing to health prod­ucts as one of the fun­da­men­tal fea­tures of a robust health sys­tem based on uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age” (p. 7)

• “Encour­ages Mem­ber States, inter­na­tional orga­ni­za­tions and other rel­e­vant stake­hold­ers to work col­lab­o­ra­tively at all lev­els to develop, test and scale up pro­duc­tion of safe, effec­tive, qual­ity, afford­able diag­nos­tics, ther­a­peu­tics, med­i­cines and vac­cines, inter alia and as appro­pri­ate through the use of exist­ing mech­a­nisms, such as the Med­i­cines Patent Pool, to pro­mote equi­table, afford­able and timely access to med­ical prod­ucts and health tech­nolo­gies in health emer­gen­cies” (p. 8)

2019 Resolution on science, technology and innovation for sustainable development

• “Not­ing that the 2019 Global Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Report iden­ti­fies sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy and inno­va­tion as one of the levers for trans­for­ma­tion to accel­er­ate progress in achiev­ing the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals and that its strate­gic deploy­ment has the poten­tial to resolve and min­i­mize trade-offs among the Goals and tar­gets, and rec­og­nizes that tech­nol­ogy trans­fer to devel­op­ing coun­tries on mutu­ally agreed terms will be crit­i­cal to scale up and accel­er­ate the imple­men­ta­tion of the 2030 Agenda for Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment” (p. 2)

• “Reaf­firm­ing that the cre­ation, devel­op­ment and dif­fu­sion of new inno­va­tions and tech­nolo­gies and asso­ci­ated know-how, includ­ing the trans­fer of tech­nol­ogy on mutu­ally agreed terms, are pow­er­ful dri­vers of eco­nomic growth and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment” (p. 3)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing also the impor­tance of uti­liz­ing sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy and inno­va­tion in a man­ner rel­e­vant to spe­cific national and local sit­u­a­tions and needs” (p. 3)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing also the impor­tance of sup­port­ing poli­cies and activ­i­ties of devel­op­ing coun­tries in the fields of sci­ence, tech­nol­ogy and inno­va­tion through North-South, South-South and tri­an­gu­lar coop­er­a­tion in the areas of finan­cial and tech­ni­cal assis­tance, capac­ity-build­ing and tech­nol­ogy trans­fer on mutu­ally agreed terms” (p. 4)

2019 WHA Resolution on improving the transparency of markets for medicines, vaccines, and other health products

• “Not­ing the impor­tance of both pub­lic- and pri­vate-sec­tor fund­ing for research and devel­op­ment of health prod­ucts, and seek­ing to improve the trans­parency of such fund­ing across the value chain” (p. 2)

• “Seek­ing to pro­gres­sively enhance the pub­licly avail­able infor­ma­tion on inputs across the value chain of health prod­ucts, the pub­lic report­ing of the rel­e­vant patents and their sta­tus, and the avail­abil­ity of infor­ma­tion on the patents land­scape cov­er­ing a par­tic­u­lar health prod­uct as well as its mar­ket­ing approval sta­tus” (p. 2)

• “1. URGES Mem­ber States in accor­dance with their national and regional legal frame­works and con­texts:
  (1) to take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to pub­licly share infor­ma­tion on the net prices2 of health prod­ucts;
  (2) to take the nec­es­sary steps, as appro­pri­ate, to sup­port dis­sem­i­na­tion and enhanced avail­abil­ity of, and access to, aggre­gated results data and, if already pub­licly avail­able or vol­un­tar­ily pro­vided, costs from human sub­ject clin­i­cal tri­als regard­less of out­comes or whether the results will sup­port an appli­ca­tion for mar­ket­ing approval, while ensur­ing patient con­fi­den­tial­ity;
  (3) to work col­lab­o­ra­tively to improve the report­ing of infor­ma­tion by sup­pli­ers on reg­is­tered health prod­ucts, such as reports on sales rev­enues, prices, units sold, mar­ket­ing costs, and sub­si­dies and incen­tives;
  (4) to facil­i­tate improved pub­lic report­ing of patent sta­tus infor­ma­tion and the mar­ket­ing approval sta­tus of health prod­ucts;
  (5) to improve national capac­i­ties, includ­ing through inter­na­tional coop­er­a­tion and open and col­lab­o­ra­tive research and devel­op­ment and pro­duc­tion of health prod­ucts, espe­cially in devel­op­ing coun­tries and low- and mid­dle-income coun­tries (LMICs), includ­ing health prod­ucts for the dis­eases that pri­mar­ily affect them, as well as for prod­uct selec­tion, cost-effec­tive pro­cure­ment, qual­ity assur­ance, and sup­ply chain man­age­ment” (p. 2)

2019 HRC Resolution on access to medicines and vaccines

• “Reaf­firm­ing the impor­tance of improv­ing the trans­parency of mar­kets for med­i­cines, vac­cines and other health prod­ucts across the whole value chain, and tak­ing into con­sid­er­a­tion res­o­lu­tion WHA72.8 adopted by the World Health Assem­bly at its sev­enty-sec­ond ses­sion” (p. 2)

• “Rec­og­niz­ing that uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age implies that all peo­ple have access with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion to nation­ally deter­mined sets of needed pro­mo­tive, pre­ven­tive, cura­tive, pal­lia­tive and reha­bil­i­ta­tive essen­tial health-care ser­vices, and essen­tial, safe, afford­able, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines and vac­cines, while ensur­ing that the use of these ser­vices does not expose users to finan­cial hard­ship, with spe­cial empha­sis on the poor, vul­ner­a­ble and mar­gin­al­ized seg­ments of the pop­u­la­tion” (p. 3)

• “Express­ing deep con­cern at recent out­breaks of highly infec­tious pathogens with pan­demic poten­tial, which demon­strate the poten­tial vul­ner­a­bil­ity of pop­u­la­tions to them, and in this con­text reaf­firm­ing and under­scor­ing the impor­tance of research into and devel­op­ment of new and inno­v­a­tive med­i­cines and vac­cines and of ensur­ing access to safe, afford­able, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines and vac­cines to all, includ­ing new and inno­v­a­tive med­i­cines, and of build­ing and/or strength­en­ing health sys­tem capac­i­ties, includ­ing pri­mary health care, for detect­ing, pre­vent­ing and respond­ing in a timely man­ner to out­breaks, epi­demics, pan­demics and other health emer­gen­cies” (p. 4)

• “Reit­er­ates the call upon States to con­tinue to col­lab­o­rate, as appro­pri­ate, on mod­els and approaches that sup­port the delink­age of the cost of new research and devel­op­ment from the prices of med­i­cines, vac­cines and diag­nos­tics for dis­eases that pre­dom­i­nantly affect devel­op­ing coun­tries, includ­ing emerg­ing and neglected trop­i­cal dis­eases, so as to ensure their sus­tained acces­si­bil­ity, afford­abil­ity and avail­abil­ity and to ensure access to treat­ment for all those in need” (p. 4)

• “Seri­ously con­cerned about the high prices of some health prod­ucts and the inequitable access within and among Mem­ber States, as well as the finan­cial hard­ships asso­ci­ated with high prices, which impede progress towards achiev­ing uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age for all” (pp. 2–3)

2019 Political declaration of the HLM on UHC

• “The high prices of some health prod­ucts, and inequitable access to such prod­ucts within and among coun­tries, as well as finan­cial hard­ships asso­ci­ated with high prices of health prod­ucts, con­tinue to impede progress towards achiev­ing uni­ver­sal health cov­er­age.” (para­graph 12)

2019 UNESC Resolution on UNAIDS

• “Calls for urgent action and part­ner­ship by Mem­ber States, the United Nations sys­tem, civil soci­ety, local com­mu­ni­ties, the pri­vate sec­tor and other stake­hold­ers to scale up evi­dence-based HIV pre­ven­tion, test­ing, treat­ment, care and reten­tion, includ­ing access to safe, effec­tive, qual­ity and afford­able med­i­cines, includ­ing gener­ics, viral load test­ing in pur­suit of achiev­ing viral load sup­pres­sion, and tuber­cu­lo­sis pre­ven­ta­tive treat­ment, to ensure that those ser­vices reach the peo­ple who need them the most, includ­ing key pop­u­la­tions that epi­demi­o­log­i­cal evi­dence shows to be glob­ally at higher risk of HIV infec­tion, ado­les­cent girls and young women, and calls for rein­vig­o­rated efforts to pro­tect human rights and pro­mote gen­der equal­ity and to address social risk fac­tors, includ­ing gen­der-based vio­lence, as well as social and eco­nomic deter­mi­nants of health.” (para­graph 4)

• “Urges Mem­ber States to urgently remove, where fea­si­ble, obsta­cles that limit the capac­ity of low- and mid­dle-income coun­tries to pro­vide afford­able and effec­tive HIV pre­ven­tion and treat­ment prod­ucts, diag­nos­tics, med­i­cines and com­modi­ties and other phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal prod­ucts.” (para­graph 5)

2019 WHA Resolution on antimicrobial resistance

• “Requests the Direc­tor Gen­eral to sup­port Mem­ber States to mobi­lize ade­quate pre­dictable and sus­tained fund­ing and human and finan­cial resources and invest­ment through national, bilat­eral and mul­ti­lat­eral chan­nels to sup­port the devel­op­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of national action plans, research and devel­op­ment on exist­ing and new antimi­cro­bial med­i­cines, diag­nos­tics, and vac­cines, and other tech­nolo­gies, and strength­en­ing of related infra­struc­ture, includ­ing through engage­ment with mul­ti­lat­eral devel­op­ment banks and tra­di­tional and vol­un­tary inno­v­a­tive financ­ing and invest­ment mech­a­nisms, based on pri­or­i­ties and local needs set by gov­ern­ments and on ensur­ing pub­lic return on invest­ment.” (para­graph 4(6))

2018 Political declaration of the HLM on the fight against TB

• “Com­mit to pro­mot­ing access to afford­able med­i­cines, includ­ing gener­ics, for scal­ing up access to afford­able tuber­cu­lo­sis treat­ment, includ­ing the treat­ment of mul­tidrug-resis­tant and exten­sively drug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis, reaf­firm­ing the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), as amended, and also reaf­firm­ing the 2001 World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of Mem­ber States to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and notes the need for appro­pri­ate incen­tives in the devel­op­ment of new health prod­ucts.” (para­graph 19)

2018 Political declaration of the third HLM on NCDs

• “Pro­mote increased access to afford­able, safe, effec­tive and qual­ity med­i­cines and diag­nos­tics and other tech­nolo­gies, reaf­firm­ing the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), as amended, and also reaf­firm­ing the 2001 Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, which rec­og­nizes that intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right of Mem­ber States to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and notes the need for appro­pri­ate incen­tives in the devel­op­ment of new health prod­ucts.” (para­graph 36)

2018 HRC Resolution on human rights in the context of HIV and AIDS

• “Reaf­firms that access to safe, effec­tive and afford­able med­i­cines, diag­no­sis and treat­ment for all, with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion, in the con­text of epi­demics such as HIV and AIDS, is fun­da­men­tal to the full real­iza­tion of the right of every­one to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of phys­i­cal and men­tal health.” (para­graph 9)

2017 Resolution on international cooperation to address and counter the world drug problem

• “Urges all Mem­ber States to enact com­pre­hen­sive mea­sures aimed at stem­ming the abuse of pre­scrip­tion drugs, in par­tic­u­lar through the estab­lish­ment of aware­ness-rais­ing ini­tia­tives tar­get­ing the gen­eral pub­lic and health-care providers.” (para­graph 45)

• “Calls upon Mem­ber States to con­tinue efforts to iden­tify and mon­i­tor trends in the com­po­si­tion, pro­duc­tion, preva­lence and dis­tri­bu­tion of new psy­choac­tive sub­stances, as well as pat­terns of use and adverse con­se­quences, and assess the risks to the health and safety of indi­vid­u­als and soci­ety as a whole and the poten­tial uses of new psy­choac­tive sub­stances for med­ical and sci­en­tific pur­poses, and on that basis to develop and strengthen domes­tic and national leg­isla­tive, reg­u­la­tory, admin­is­tra­tive and oper­a­tional responses and prac­tices by domes­tic and national leg­isla­tive, law enforce­ment, judi­ciary, social and wel­fare, edu­ca­tional and health author­i­ties.” (para­graph 55)

• “Invites Mem­ber States to tar­get the illicit cul­ti­va­tion of crops used for the illicit pro­duc­tion and man­u­fac­ture of drugs and address related fac­tors by imple­ment­ing com­pre­hen­sive strate­gies aimed at alle­vi­at­ing poverty and strength­en­ing the rule of law, account­able, effec­tive and inclu­sive insti­tu­tions and pub­lic ser­vices and insti­tu­tional frame­works, as appro­pri­ate, and by pro­mot­ing sus­tain­able devel­op­ment aimed at enhanc­ing the wel­fare of the affected and vul­ner­a­ble pop­u­la­tion through licit alter­na­tives.” (para­graph 56)

2016 Resolution on Women, the Girl Child and HIV and AIDS

• “Address bar­ri­ers, reg­u­la­tions, poli­cies and prac­tices that pre­vent access to afford­able HIV treat­ment by pro­mot­ing generic com­pe­ti­tion, in order to help to reduce the costs asso­ci­ated with life­long chronic care and by encour­ag­ing all States to apply mea­sures and pro­ce­dures for enforc­ing intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights in such a man­ner as to avoid cre­at­ing bar­ri­ers to the legit­i­mate trade in med­i­cines and to pro­vide for safe­guards against the abuse of such mea­sures and pro­ce­dures.” (para­graph 13(b))

2014 Resolution on efforts to control and eliminate malaria by 2015

• “Urges the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity, inter alia, to sup­port the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuber­cu­lo­sis and Malaria to enable it to meet its finan­cial needs and, through coun­try-led ini­tia­tives with ade­quate inter­na­tional sup­port, to inten­sify access to afford­able, safe and effec­tive anti­malar­ial treat­ments, includ­ing artemisinin-based com­bi­na­tion ther­a­pies, inter­mit­tent pre­ven­tive ther­a­pies for preg­nant women, chil­dren under 5 and infants, ade­quate diag­nos­tic facil­i­ties, long-last­ing insec­ti­cide-treated mos­quito nets, includ­ing, where appro­pri­ate, through the free dis­tri­bu­tion of such nets and, where appro­pri­ate, to insec­ti­cides for indoor resid­ual spray­ing for malaria con­trol, tak­ing into account rel­e­vant inter­na­tional rules, includ­ing the Stock­holm Con­ven­tion on Per­sis­tent Organic Pol­lu­tants stan­dards and guide­lines.” (para­graph 13)

• “Rec­og­nizes the impor­tance of the devel­op­ment of safe and cost-effec­tive vac­cines and new med­i­cines to pre­vent and treat malaria and the need for fur­ther and accel­er­ated research, includ­ing into safe, effec­tive and high-qual­ity ther­a­pies, using rig­or­ous stan­dards, includ­ing by pro­vid­ing sup­port to the Spe­cial Pro­gramme for Research and Train­ing in Trop­i­cal Dis­eases, through effec­tive global part­ner­ships, such as the var­i­ous malaria vac­cine ini­tia­tives and the Med­i­cines for Malaria Ven­ture, where nec­es­sary stim­u­lated by new incen­tives to secure their devel­op­ment, and through effec­tive and timely sup­port for the pre-qual­i­fi­ca­tion of new anti­malar­i­als and their com­bi­na­tions.” (para­graph 20)

• “Calls upon the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity, includ­ing through exist­ing part­ner­ships, to increase invest­ment in and efforts towards research to opti­mize cur­rent tools, develop and val­i­date new, safe and afford­able malaria-related med­i­cines, prod­ucts and tech­nolo­gies, such as vac­cines, rapid diag­nos­tic tests, insec­ti­cides and their deliv­ery modes, to pre­vent and treat malaria, espe­cially for at-risk chil­dren and preg­nant women, and test­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for inte­gra­tion in order to enhance effec­tive­ness and delay the onset of resis­tance.” (para­graph 21)

• “Reaf­firms the right to use, to the fullest extent, the pro­vi­sions con­tained in the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights (TRIPS Agree­ment), the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, the deci­sion of the Gen­eral Coun­cil of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion of 30 August 2003 on the imple­men­ta­tion of para­graph 6 of the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health, and, when for­mal accep­tance pro­ce­dures are com­pleted, the amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment, which pro­vide flex­i­bil­i­ties for the pro­tec­tion of pub­lic health, and in par­tic­u­lar to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all and to encour­age the pro­vi­sion of assis­tance to devel­op­ing coun­tries in this regard, and calls for the broad and timely accep­tance of the amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment, as pro­posed by the Gen­eral Coun­cil of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion in its deci­sion of 6 Decem­ber 2005.” (para­graph 23)

2009 ECOSOC Resolution on UNAIDS

• “Urges Gov­ern­ments to pri­or­i­tize and expand access to the pre­ven­tion and treat­ment of HIV-related oppor­tunis­tic infec­tions, to pro­mote access to and the effec­tive use of safe and effec­tive anti­retro­vi­ral drugs of assured qual­ity, at afford­able prices, and to sup­port both bio­med­ical and socio-eco­nomic research on new prod­ucts to pre­vent HIV infec­tion, includ­ing those con­trolled by women, diag­nos­tics, med­i­cines and other treat­ment com­modi­ties and tech­nolo­gies related to HIV.” (para­graph 11)

• “Reaf­firms the right to use, to the full, the pro­vi­sions con­tained in the Agree­ment on Trade-related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights, the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the Agree­ment on Trade-related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights and Pub­lic Health, and the deci­sion of the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Gen­eral Coun­cil of 30 August 2003 on the imple­men­ta­tion of para­graph 6 of the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and pub­lic health, and, when for­mal accep­tance pro­ce­dures are com­pleted, the amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment, which pro­vide flex­i­bil­i­ties for the pro­tec­tion of pub­lic health, and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all, and also calls for a broad and timely accep­tance of the amend­ment to arti­cle 31 of the Agree­ment on Trade-related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights, as pro­posed by the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion Gen­eral Coun­cil in its deci­sion of 6 Decem­ber 2005.” (para­graph 9)

2007 WHA Resolution on tuberculosis control: progress and long-term planning

• “Urges all mem­ber states to develop and imple­ment long-term plans for tuber­cu­lo­sis pre­ven­tion and con­trol in line with the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006–2015, in the con­text of over­all health devel­op­ment plans, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with other pro­grammes (includ­ing those on HIV/AIDS, child health and strength­en­ing of health sys­tems), and through national Stop TB part­ner­ships where appro­pri­ate, with the aim of con­trol­ling the emer­gence and trans­mis­sion of multi-drug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis, includ­ing exten­sively drug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis, by ensur­ing the high-qual­ity imple­men­ta­tion of the DOTS strat­egy and by prompt imple­men­ta­tion of infec­tion-con­trol pre­cau­tions.” (para­graph 1(1)(d))

• “Urges all mem­ber states to develop and imple­ment long-term plans for tuber­cu­lo­sis pre­ven­tion and con­trol in line with the Global Plan to Stop TB 2006–2015, in the con­text of over­all health devel­op­ment plans, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with other pro­grammes (includ­ing those on HIV/AIDS, child health and strength­en­ing of health sys­tems), and through national Stop TB part­ner­ships where appro­pri­ate, with the aim of: if affected, imme­di­ately address­ing exten­sively drug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis and HIV-related tuber­cu­lo­sis as part of the over­all Stop TB strat­egy, as the high­est health pri­or­i­ties.” (para­graph 1(1)(e))

• “Requests the direc­tor-gen­eral to strengthen urgently WHO’s sup­port to coun­tries affected by mul­tidrug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis and espe­cially exten­sively drug-resis­tant tuber­cu­lo­sis, and to coun­tries highly affected by HIV-related tuber­cu­lo­sis.” (para­graph 2(3))

• “Requests the direc­tor-gen­eral to sup­port Mem­ber States in devel­op­ing lab­o­ra­tory capac­ity to pro­vide for rapid drug-sus­cep­ti­bil­ity test­ing of iso­lates obtained from all per­sons with cul­ture-pos­i­tive tuber­cu­lo­sis, to develop con­sen­sus guide­lines for rapid drug-sus­cep­ti­bil­ity test meth­ods and appro­pri­ate mea­sures for lab­o­ra­tory strength­en­ing, and to mobi­lize fund­ing.” (para­graph 2(3))

2007 WHA Resolution on progress in the rational use of medicines

• “Requests Direc­tor Gen­eral in col­lab­o­ra­tion with gov­ern­ments and civil soci­ety, to strengthen WHO’s tech­ni­cal sup­port to Mem­ber States in their efforts to estab­lish or strengthen, where appro­pri­ate, mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary national bod­ies for mon­i­tor­ing med­i­cine use, and imple­ment­ing national pro­grammes for the ratio­nal use of med­i­cines.” (para­graph 2(2))

2006 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS

• “Reaf­firm that the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion’s Agree­ment on Trade-Related Aspects of Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty Rights does not and should not pre­vent mem­bers from tak­ing mea­sures now and in the future to pro­tect pub­lic health. Accord­ingly, while reit­er­at­ing our com­mit­ment to the TRIPS Agree­ment, reaf­firm that the Agree­ment can and should be inter­preted and imple­mented in a man­ner sup­port­ive of the right to pro­tect pub­lic health and, in par­tic­u­lar, to pro­mote access to med­i­cines for all includ­ing the pro­duc­tion of generic anti­retro­vi­ral drugs and other essen­tial drugs for AIDS-related infec­tions. In this con­nec­tion, we reaf­firm the right to use, to the full, the pro­vi­sions in the TRIPS Agree­ment, the Doha Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health and the World Trade Orga­ni­za­tion’s Gen­eral Coun­cil Deci­sion of 2003 and amend­ments to Arti­cle 31, which pro­vide flex­i­bil­i­ties for this pur­pose.” (para­graph 43)

2005 Resolution on the World Summit outcome

• “To pro­vide, with the aim of an AIDS-, malaria- and tuber­cu­lo­sis-free gen­er­a­tion in Africa, assis­tance for pre­ven­tion and care and to come as close as pos­si­ble to achiev­ing the goal of uni­ver­sal access by 2010 to HIV/AIDS treat­ment in African coun­tries, to encour­age phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies to make drugs, includ­ing anti­retro­vi­ral drugs, afford­able and acces­si­ble in Africa and to ensure increased bilat­eral and mul­ti­lat­eral assis­tance, where pos­si­ble on a grant basis, to com­bat malaria, tuber­cu­lo­sis and other infec­tious dis­eases in Africa through the strength­en­ing of health sys­tems.” (para­graph 68(i))

2003 WHA on global health-sector strategy for HIV/AIDS

• “Exhorts Mem­ber States, as a mat­ter of urgency to reaf­firm that pub­lic health inter­ests are para­mount in both phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal and health poli­cies, to rec­og­nize the dif­fi­cul­ties faced by devel­op­ing coun­tries in effec­tive use of com­pul­sory licens­ing in accor­dance with the Dec­la­ra­tion on the TRIPS Agree­ment and Pub­lic Health (Doha Dec­la­ra­tion), and, when nec­es­sary, to use the flex­i­bil­i­ties in the TRIPS Agree­ment in order to meet the needs of devel­op­ing coun­tries for drugs against HIV/AIDS.” (para­graph 2(5))

2000 WHA on HIV/AIDS: confronting the epidemic

• “Urges Mem­ber states to increase access to treat­ment and pro­phy­laxis of HIV-related ill­nesses through mea­sures such as ensur­ing the pro­vi­sion and afford­abil­ity of drugs, includ­ing a reli­able dis­tri­bu­tion and deliv­ery sys­tem; imple­men­ta­tion of a strong generic drug pol­icy; bulk pur­chas­ing; nego­ti­a­tion with phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies; appro­pri­ate financ­ing sys­tems; and encour­age­ment of local man­u­fac­tur­ing and import prac­tices con­sis­tent with national laws and inter­na­tional agree­ments acceded to.” (para­graph 1(16))

• “Urges Mem­ber States to ensure that blood trans­fu­sion ser­vices do not con­sti­tute an HIV risk fac­tor by ensur­ing that all indi­vid­u­als have access to safe blood and blood prod­ucts that are acces­si­ble and ade­quate to meet their needs, are obtained from vol­un­tary, non­re­mu­ner­ated blood donors, are trans­fused only when nec­es­sary, and are pro­vided as part of a sus­tain­able blood trans­fu­sion pro­gramme within the exist­ing health care sys­tem.” (para­graph 1(7))

Expert precedents

2021 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to health

• “The Spe­cial Rap­por­teur rec­om­mends that bio­med­ical arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) tech­nolo­gies must not per­pet­u­ate racism, sex­ism, ableism or dis­crim­i­na­tion based on sex­ual ori­en­ta­tion or gen­der. States must elim­i­nate social and polit­i­cal inequal­i­ties in order to bridge the gen­dered dig­i­tal divide, tak­ing into account the needs of peo­ple with dis­abil­i­ties, which includes offer­ing pro­tec­tions from dis­crim­i­na­tion and vio­lence related to uti­liza­tion of dig­i­tal tools and tech­nol­ogy.” (para­graph 87)

2016 General Comment No.22 on the Right to Sexual and Reproductive Health

• “States par­ties should ensure, in com­pli­ance with their Covenant oblig­a­tions, that their bilat­eral, regional and inter­na­tional agree­ments deal­ing with intel­lec­tual prop­erty or trade and eco­nomic exchange do not impede access to med­i­cines, diag­nos­tics or related tech­nolo­gies required for pre­ven­tion or treat­ment of HIV/AIDS or other dis­eases related to sex­ual and repro­duc­tive health. States should ensure that inter­na­tional agree­ments and domes­tic leg­is­la­tion incor­po­rate to the fullest extent any safe­guards and flex­i­bil­i­ties therein that may be used to pro­mote and ensure access to med­i­cines and health care for all. States par­ties should review their inter­na­tional agree­ments, includ­ing on trade and invest­ment, to ensure that they are con­sis­tent with the pro­tec­tion of the right to sex­ual and repro­duc­tive health, and should amend them as nec­es­sary.” (para­graph 51)

2009 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to health

• “Devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs should estab­lish high patentabil­ity stan­dards and pro­vide for exclu­sions from patentabil­ity, such as new forms and new or sec­ond uses, and com­bi­na­tions, in order to address ever­green­ing and facil­i­tate generic entry of med­i­cines.” (para­graph 100)

• “Devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs should adopt the prin­ci­ple of inter­na­tional exhaus­tion and pro­vide for par­al­lel impor­ta­tion with sim­pli­fied pro­ce­dures in their national laws.” (para­graph 101)

• “Devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs need to incor­po­rate in their national patent laws all pos­si­ble grounds upon which com­pul­sory licences, includ­ing gov­ern­ment use, may be issued. Such laws pro­vide straight­for­ward, trans­par­ent pro­ce­dures for rapid issue of com­pul­sory licences. There is also a need to revisit the 30 August deci­sion and pro­vide for a sim­pler mech­a­nism.” (para­graph 102)

• “Devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs should specif­i­cally adopt and apply pro-com­pe­ti­tion mea­sures to pre­vent the abuse of the patent sys­tem, par­tic­u­larly in regard to access to med­i­cines.” (para­graph 103)

• “LDCs and devel­op­ing coun­tries should actively pro­mote the par­tic­i­pa­tion of indi­vid­u­als and com­mu­ni­ties in deci­sion-mak­ing processes relat­ing to TRIPS and TRIPS flex­i­bil­i­ties and con­duct impact assess­ments of the same.” (para­graph 107)

• “Devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs should not intro­duce TRIPS-plus stan­dards in their national laws. Devel­oped coun­tries should not encour­age devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs to enter into TRIPS-plus FTAs and should be mind­ful of actions which may infringe upon the right to health.” (para­graph 108)

• “Flex­i­bil­i­ties were included in TRIPS to allow States to take into con­sid­er­a­tion their eco­nomic and devel­op­ment needs. States need to take steps to facil­i­tate the use of TRIPS flex­i­bil­i­ties.” (para­graph 96)

• “The Spe­cial Rap­por­teur there­fore rec­om­mends that devel­op­ing coun­tries and LDCs should review their laws and poli­cies and con­sider whether they have made full use of TRIPS flex­i­bil­i­ties or included TRIPS-plus mea­sures, and if nec­es­sary con­sider amend­ing their laws and poli­cies to make full use of the flex­i­bil­i­ties.” (para­graph 97)

Evidence

2021 WHO Consolidated Guidelines on HIV Prevention, Testing, Treatment, Service Delivery and Monitoring

• “The lack of access to appro­pri­ate anti­fun­gal ther­a­pies and in vitro diag­nos­tics for rapid detec­tion of histo­plas­mo­sis and the co-occur­rence of other infec­tious dis­eases, espe­cially TB, may affect clin­i­cal out­comes and under­lie the high mor­tal­ity of dis­sem­i­nated histo­plas­mo­sis among peo­ple liv­ing with HIV.” (p. 216)