In separate virtual addresses to the shareholders of Moderna, Pfizer, and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Oxfam called on the pharmaceutical corporations to improve COVID-19 vaccine equity and access so that everyone, everywhere, has access to these life-saving shots.
Oxfam’s resolutions to Moderna and Pfizer called on the companies to study the feasibility of transferring vaccine technology and know-how to urgently ramp up production and improve sustainable access around the world.
In a separate resolution before Johnson & Johnson shareholders, Oxfam sought transparency on how the company determines pricing for its COVID vaccines in light of the billions of dollars of public funding the company received from US taxpayers.
Oxfam urged all three vaccine manufacturers to share their technical know-how with the World Health Organization (WHO) to leverage the world’s full manufacturing capacity and support regionally-based production. The aim is to increase the overall supply, reduce on-the-ground distributional challenges, and respond to the desire of low- and middle-income countries to produce doses for their own citizens.
In his unprecedented presentation of the Oxfam resolution to Moderna shareholders via a pre-recorded statement, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO, said “If Moderna worked with us, we could submit the WHO’s COVID-19 Vaccine mRNA Technology Transfer hub’s vaccine for approval at least one-year sooner”. This, he said, would save lives, decrease the risk of variants, and reduce the pandemic’s economic toll.
“We urge Moderna to share technology and know-how with the WHO hub and commit to not enforcing patents for COVID-19 and other essential vaccines in countries hosting the WHO hub and spokes. We also urge them to offer training to scientists working on those efforts through the Moderna mRNA access program”.
Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus
Battling greatest public health crisis in a century
Ady Barkan also said “We are in the midst of the greatest public health crisis in 100 years. Despite safe and effective vaccines like Pfizer’s, thousands of people are still dying every day because protections against the coronavirus have not been made accessible to all”.
The Founder and Co-Executive Director of ‘Be A Hero’, added that “Billions of people remain unvaccinated in part because Pfizer cannot produce enough doses on its own. And yet, Pfizer refuses to share its technology to boost global manufacturing”.
Maaza Seyoum, Global South Convener of the People’s Vaccine Alliance, averred that the Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine has protected people against severe illness and saved lives. However, the company has not done enough to ensure equitable access and transparency about its pricing strategy, “despite the massive investment of 1.5 billion dollars in public funds that JNJ received”.
“This injustice has heartbreaking consequences. Millions of grandparents and healthcare workers across Africa are not protected from this virus. In India alone, over two million children have lost a parent to the pandemic. These lives matter”.
Maaza Seyoum.
Oxfam filed the shareholder resolutions because more than two years into the COVID-19 pandemic and a year after the introduction of highly effective life-saving vaccines, 74 percent of people in high-income countries are fully vaccinated, while just 12 percent of people in low-income countries are.
The failure of major pharmaceutical companies to do more to ensure vaccine equity and access, according to Oxfam, threatens the companies’ reputations and the interests of corporate investors who are impacted by the pandemic’s continued impact on the global economy, in addition to the devastating toll in illness and death.
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