Several gatherings are scheduled for Tuesday evening, November 30 in Paris and in several provincial towns to request the lifting of patents on vaccines and treatments against Covid-19, at the call of several unions and NGOs.
Read also Covid: why suspending patents would be a dangerous measure for the future
Appointment is given in Paris place de la Bourse at 6:00 p.m., with the participation of the CGT Santé Social Action, SUD Santé Sociales, Attac, the collective "
Patents on anti-Covid vaccines, stop.
Requisition!
», Of the Association of emergency physicians of France, of the League of Human Rights.
240,000 people in support of a European Citizens' Initiative
Gatherings are also planned in Lille, Rouen, Périgueux, Toulouse, Sarlat, as well as in Geneva, where the ministerial conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) was to open on Tuesday. This was ultimately canceled due to the worrying spread of the Covid-19 variant Omicron. Candles will be lit, "
symbols of the lives that could have been saved if we had lifted the patents on vaccines and treatments
", explained Thursday during a press conference François Nay, of the collective "
Patents on vaccines anti-Covid, stop. Requisition!
".
The maintenance of patents leads to an "
organized shortage
" of vaccines, to high prices and to "
vaccine apartheid
", with "
75% of injections carried out in ten countries
", less than 5% in Africa, denounced Frank Prouhet, also a member of this collective. This situation favors the appearance of variants from which all countries suffer, he argued. The organizers criticize the way in which the European Union opposes the lifting of patents, and the failure, according to them, of the Covax mechanism, which is supposed to provide the 92 poorest countries on the planet with free access to vaccines. They also believe that patents are not justified, while vaccines against Covid have largely benefited from public money.
Read alsoCovid-19: the turnaround of the United States paves the way for the lifting of patents on vaccines
“
A patent is supposed to reward risk taking and investment.
When they are at this point covered, with this safety net at all stages, one wonders what the real risks are,
”asked Jérôme Martin, of the Observatory for transparency in drug policies.
Some 240,000 people on Monday gave their support to a European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) calling for the "
European Commission to take measures to make vaccines and anti-pandemic treatments a global public good, freely accessible to all
".
