E-DRUG: Cross-border Health Threats and Pandemic Preparedness:
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VIRTUAL EVENT 23.3 Cross-border Health Threats and Pandemic Preparedness: Opportunities and Challenges for the EU Contribution to Global Health
The COVID-19 pandemic has renewed the urgency of addressing key elements of the access to medicines (and health technologies) continuum: from public support to research and development to health-sensitive intellectual property management or the role of public institutions and resources in supporting alternative innovation mechanisms.
Considering this, the European Union's commitments towards global health, the coherence of discussions taking place in Brussels, as well as the various processes and proposals being discussed and examined in Geneva, namely at the World Health Organization and World Trade Organization, demand our attention.
For this roundtable meeting, we have gathered leading European civil society organisations to inform the discussions and assist in the deliberations of these critical dossiers, providing lawmakers and other stakeholders with evidence-based insight and expertise.
Wednesday 23 March, 10.00 - 11.30 (CET)
ZOOM Meeting
Register: https://bit.ly/cross-border-health
Introduction and context (Jaume Vidal, Health Action International)
TRIPS waiver and Pandemic Preparedness: How is the EU hindering/contributing to a global response? (Dimitri Eynikel, MSF Access Campaign)
C-TAP and licensing of health technologies: The role of public research institutions in the response to the pandemic (Irene Bernal, Salud por Derecho)
European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA) and Global Health: Needs, means and constraints. (Marcin Rodzinka-Verhelle, European Public Health Alliance)
Global responses to COVID-19: Lessons learnt from Team Europe and other initiatives. (Ella Weggen, WEMOS)
Why is this important now?
The debates around the proposal by South Africa and India for a temporary waiver on the WTO agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS) and deliberations at the WHO on how to better respond to the next pandemic show how governments and other stakeholders seek to find answers to the dilemmas of a critical moment for global health. The EU (and its Member States) plays a major role in most of these processes, as well as in others equally significant ones, including the WHO'sCOVID-19 Technologies Access Pool (C-TAP).
At the same time, the EU is undertaking its own consequential design, discussion, and implementation processes with profound implications not only development, manufacturing and delivery of health technologies, but also for the response to health threats, in the EU and beyond. Several initiatives, such as the proposed European Pharmaceutical Strategy or the European Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority (HERA), will shape the debate around access to medicines for the years to come with an impact that goes, again, beyond the boundaries of the EU.
Jaume Vidal (He/Him)
Senior Policy Advisor- European Projects Team
Health Action International (HAI)
Overtoom 60 (2)
1054 HK Amsterdam
Jaume Vidal <jaume@haiweb.org>