A proposal by India, South Africa and eight other countries calls on the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to exempt member countries from enforcing some patents, a move that will see the rapid scaling- up of manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments.

For now, Intellectual Property (IP) rights under the organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, known as TRIPS, may restrict the scaling up of manufacturing of vaccines, so in a case where the virus resurges, progress on treatments and vaccines must be sufficient, timely and equal.

According to a notice by Indian Representative of India to the WTO, few members have raised concerns about the proposal, while a large proportion of the WTO membership supports the proposal. Part of the notice reads, “The fundamental question is whether there will be enough of Covid-19 vaccines to go around. As things stand, even the most optimistic scenarios today cannot assure access to Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutics for the majority of the population, in rich as well as poor countries, by the end of 2021.”