Cargando…
Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine
The recent rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines offers hope in addressing the worst pandemic in a hundred years. However, many countries in the Global South face great difficulties in accessing vaccines, partly because of restrictive intellectual property law. These laws exacerbate both global and...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BMJ Publishing Group
2021
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8277484/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34253631 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006169 |
_version_ | 1783722082988720128 |
---|---|
author | Sekalala, Sharifah Forman, Lisa Hodgson, Timothy Mulumba, Moses Namyalo-Ganafa, Hadijah Meier, Benjamin Mason |
author_facet | Sekalala, Sharifah Forman, Lisa Hodgson, Timothy Mulumba, Moses Namyalo-Ganafa, Hadijah Meier, Benjamin Mason |
author_sort | Sekalala, Sharifah |
collection | PubMed |
description | The recent rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines offers hope in addressing the worst pandemic in a hundred years. However, many countries in the Global South face great difficulties in accessing vaccines, partly because of restrictive intellectual property law. These laws exacerbate both global and domestic inequalities and prevent countries from fully realising the right to health for all their people. Commodification of essential medicines, such as vaccines, pushes poorer countries into extreme debt and reproduces national inequalities that discriminate against marginalised groups. This article explains how a decolonial framing of human rights and public health could contribute to addressing this systemic injustice. We envisage a human rights and global health law framework based on solidarity and international cooperation that focuses funding on long-term goals and frees access to medicines from the restrictions of intellectual property law. This would increase domestic vaccine production, acquisition and distribution capabilities in the Global South. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8277484 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | BMJ Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-82774842021-07-15 Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine Sekalala, Sharifah Forman, Lisa Hodgson, Timothy Mulumba, Moses Namyalo-Ganafa, Hadijah Meier, Benjamin Mason BMJ Glob Health Analysis The recent rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines offers hope in addressing the worst pandemic in a hundred years. However, many countries in the Global South face great difficulties in accessing vaccines, partly because of restrictive intellectual property law. These laws exacerbate both global and domestic inequalities and prevent countries from fully realising the right to health for all their people. Commodification of essential medicines, such as vaccines, pushes poorer countries into extreme debt and reproduces national inequalities that discriminate against marginalised groups. This article explains how a decolonial framing of human rights and public health could contribute to addressing this systemic injustice. We envisage a human rights and global health law framework based on solidarity and international cooperation that focuses funding on long-term goals and frees access to medicines from the restrictions of intellectual property law. This would increase domestic vaccine production, acquisition and distribution capabilities in the Global South. BMJ Publishing Group 2021-07-12 /pmc/articles/PMC8277484/ /pubmed/34253631 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006169 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2021. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) . |
spellingShingle | Analysis Sekalala, Sharifah Forman, Lisa Hodgson, Timothy Mulumba, Moses Namyalo-Ganafa, Hadijah Meier, Benjamin Mason Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title | Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title_full | Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title_fullStr | Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title_full_unstemmed | Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title_short | Decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the COVID-19 vaccine |
title_sort | decolonising human rights: how intellectual property laws result in unequal access to the covid-19 vaccine |
topic | Analysis |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8277484/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34253631 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006169 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT sekalalasharifah decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine AT formanlisa decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine AT hodgsontimothy decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine AT mulumbamoses decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine AT namyaloganafahadijah decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine AT meierbenjaminmason decolonisinghumanrightshowintellectualpropertylawsresultinunequalaccesstothecovid19vaccine |