2 March │ 09:00 – 13:30 │ Register HERE
3 March │ 14:00 – 17:30 │ Register HERE

The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the extent to which pharmaceutical companies limit access to lifesaving medicines and profit from the public health crisis, benefiting from billions of euros in public subsidies without having to forgo intellectual property rights. Medicines and medical devices are not a consumer good like any other; and patients’ lives cannot be measured in purely economic terms. Both are an essential public good and a core element of health policy. Since the first months of the pandemic, lawmakers and activists have urged members of WTO to use the Trade Related Aspects of the Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) waiver to gain access to potential vaccines and drugs against the new coronavirus for everybody.

This event series brings together experts from academia, policymaking and civil society in a collective discussion on the current global legal framework regulating the access to lifesaving medicines and vaccines.

DAY 2 – Wednesday 03/03/2021 – 14:00 – 15:30

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PROGRAMME

DAY 1  – Tuesday 02/03/2021 – 9:00 – 10:30

Patent protection of medicines and vaccines outside the EU in times of health crises – Everyone deserves protection from COVID 19

• 9:00 Opening of the 2-days event by Kateřina Konečná -MEP, The Left group health expert

 

PANEL I. – TRIPS & WTO and EU role in making vaccines/medicine a global public good available to all

Languages: EN, FR, DE, EL, CS, ES, PT

• 9:05 Opening of the panel by Helmut Scholz/Emmanuel Maurel

• 9:15 Professor Carlos Correa – Executive Director of the South Centre

•   9:30 Dimitri Eynikel – Policy Team Co-Coordinator & EU Advisor Médecins Sans Frontières – Access Campaign

•   9:45 Sangeeta Shashikan – TWN Legal Adviser to the Third World Network, the Coordinator of the TWN office in Geneva

• 10:00 Q&A

• 10:20 Closing by Claire Daly/Helmut Scholz

 

PANEL II. – Beyond COVAX, for a fair and equitable global access to vaccines

Languages: EN, FR, DE, EL, ES, PT

• 11:00 Opening of the panel by Miguel Urban – The LEFT coordinator in the DEVE Committee
• 11:10 Lebogang Mulaisi – the Congress of South Africa Trade Unions

• 11:25  Benny Kuruvilla – Focus on the Global South -South Asia Coordinator

• 11:40  Fernanda Melchionna e Silva – PSOL (Partido Socialismo e Liberdade) – member of the Brazilian Federal Parliament

• 11:55 Q&A

• 12:20 Closing by:  Manon Aubry – Co Chair of The Left

 

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European unity and solidarity in the time of the pandemic: Vaccines, treatments and other challenges

 

PANEL I. – The impact of EU’s IPR framework on accessibility of COVID 19 vaccines and treatments: Thinking out of box

Languages: EN, FR, DE, EL

• 14:00 Opening of the second day and of the panel by Marc Botenga
• 14:10 Julie Steendam – Campaign coordinator of the European Citizens’ Initiative Right to Cure-No Profit on pandemics

• 14:30 Penny Clarke – Deputy General Secretary, Head of EU Policy, Trade, Human Resources

• 14:50  David Hammerstein – Co-founder of Commons Network and member of “European Alliance for responsible r&d and affordable medicines”

• 15:10 Q&A

• 15:20 Closing by: Petros Kokkalis

PANEL II. – Transparency and accountability on EU’s advance purchase agreements (APAs) on vaccine and their negotiation

Languages: EN, FR, DE, EL, CS

 

• 16:00 Opening by: Petros Kokkalis
• 16:10 Yannis Natsis – Policy Advisor EPHA / Board Member EMA

• 16:30 Olivier Hoedeman – Research and campaign coordinator, Corporate Europe Observatory

• 16:50   Andreas Xanthos – Member of the Greek Parliament, former Minister of Health

• 17:10 Q&A

• 17:20 Closing by Marc Botenga

 

#TripsWaiver

#NoProfitOnPandemic