Biden Betrays Manufacturers with Vaccine Patent Waiver
President Joe Biden on Wednesday endorsed a controversial proposal to share COVID vaccine manufacturing details with the world. The so-called “intellectual property waiver” will waive any vaccine patent and is a slap in the face to the top minds and manufacturers who worked nonstop for months to create, test, and produce vaccines and is sure to disincentivize investment in future therapies.
Take German company BioNTech, for example. The company spent more than a decade developing the mRNA technology that made its COVID vaccine possible. With its precious research given to the world for free, BioNTech has little incentive to pursue treatment for other diseases.
“There is proprietary know-how that has to be transferred by the owner,” explains a spokesperson for ReiThera, an Italian vaccine manufacturer. “And then there is the problem with process materials, which at the moment have delivery times of almost a year.”
The push to share manufacturing details comes from low-income nations and Democrats. They insist the vaccine patent waiver is the only way to expand access to COVID vaccines.
This is not true. World Trade Organization rules already require vaccine inventors to license technology to low-income countries in an emergency. This is already happening, though Democrats say the process is slowing vaccine production.
Another key issue here is safety.
Included in a traditional patent license is the understanding that any inventor ensure his product is manufactured safely and correctly. Such regulation will be impossible if the vaccine patent waiver gets approval. This will put the lives of people in low-income nations in even greater danger.
The White House has already agreed to release 60 million doses of AstraZeneca as soon as the FDA approves it. The White House is also working tirelessly with other manufacturers to determine how best to export vaccines to countries without liability protection for potential side effects.
European nations and top COVID expert Anthony Fauci oppose the proposal to waive vaccine patents. He says there are better ways to increase vaccine production throughout the world.
“The limiting factor for the production of vaccines are manufacturing capacities and high quality standards, not the patents,” explains a spokesperson for the German government. “The protection of intellectual property is a source of innovation and this has to remain so in the future.”
Author’s Note: Under President Donald Trump’s leadership, the United States invented and produced a vaccine in record-breaking time to save the world from a deadly virus that our top rival (China) released while at the same time going to great lengths to stop that rival from stealing intellectual property, spying, and infiltrating universities.
Now, under President Biden and the vaccine patent waiver, we are handing over intellectual property for free to China and the rest of the world while breaking patents and legal protections for inventors.
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Let’s compromise. If a company took trump’s socialist Warp Speed money, they have to share their intellectual property rights. Socialism for all involved.
If you developed the vaccine on your own (capitalism), you get to keep the rights to your vaccine.
So, Pfizer gets to keep their property rights, everyone else that took our money, has to share.
Sound fair?