Professor Aisling McMahon:

I will comment on the role of intellectual property rights. I disagree regarding the incentive intellectual property represents. Traditionally, it has been problematic in the vaccine context for various reasons. More broadly, while intellectual property rights exist, other human rights also exist. Many UN committees have already considered the impact of lack of access to vaccines on low- and middle-income countries. Many of them have highlighted that we also have the right to health and life and we also have a duty to co-operate at an international level. Many of those committees have highlighted that companies and states should not block a comprehensive waiver if there are global access issues in this context and there are.

At the international level, we see the human rights obligations that companies and states have. In 2021, the International Commission of Jurists, a group of over 85 experts, highlighted that states that continue to block a comprehensive global waiver are in breach of several of their obligations under various international human rights treaties that go beyond intellectual property rights. We have obligations under the WTO at an intellectual property level but we also have human rights obligations, which we are likely to continue to be in breach of by not supporting a waiver and certainly by obstructing discussions in this context. It is important to also recognise those issues in this context.