The outline of an essential Global Pandemic Treaty (GS Paper 2, Government policies and interventions for development)
Context:
- An estimated 18 million people may have died from COVID-19, according various credible estimates, a scale of loss not seen since the Second World War.
- Over 120 million people are pushed into extreme poverty, and a massive global recession.
- Now, the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the monkey-pox outbreak as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
Pandemic v/s Epidemic:
- According to the WHO, a pandemic is declared when a new disease for which people do not have immunity spreads around the world beyond expectations.
- An epidemic is a large outbreak, one that spreads among a population or region. It is less severe than pandemic due to a limited area of spread.
Covid-19
- The novel corona virus outbreak in 2019-2020 with the nickname COVID-19 is a new strain of viruses which can cause fever, cough, breathing difficulties, pneumonia and even death in humans. WHO declared COVID-19 infections as a public health emergency of international concern and later called it a pandemic.
- Corona virus consists of an RNA genome and is one of the largest in the RNA family.
- Corona viruses are enveloped and contain single-stranded positive-sense RNA.
Health inequity created by Covid-19:
- Socio-economic consequences of Covid-19: They are irreversible in low and low middle-income countries, while high-income economies are recovering.
- Monopolies held by pharma majors: such as Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, even as fewer of their vaccines reached people in low-income countries.
- Vaccination: Only 3% of people in low-income countries had been vaccinated with at least one dose, compared to 18% in high-income countries.
- Precautions: Six to eight weeks after the PHEIC declaration, countries, except for Asia, did not take the requisite precautions.
- Covid Vaccine and treatment: When world leaders pledged $07 billion in a digital fundraiser for developing a corona virus vaccine and treatments, the United States did not send any representative.
India’s role:
- India produces nearly 60% of the world’s vaccines and is said to account for 60%-80% of the United Nations’ annual vaccine procurement.
- India continued the shipment of vaccines and other diagnostics even when it was experiencing a vaccine shortage for domestic use.
- India shipped 35 lakh doses of ‘Made-in-India’ COVID-19 vaccines to 72 countries.
What is the pandemic treaty?
- The World health organization established an intergovernmental negotiating body (INB) to draft and negotiate the contents of the pandemic treaty in compliance with Article 19 of the WHO Constitution.
- The pandemic treaty is expected to cover aspects like: Data sharing and genome sequencing of emerging viruses; Equitable distribution of vaccines and drugs; Related research throughout the world.
Importance of Global Pandemic Treaty:
- Build coherence and avoid fragmentation: A treaty under the umbrella of WHO would build coherence and avoid fragmentation.
- Early warning system: It will formally commit governments and parliaments to implement an early warning system and a properly funded rapid response mechanism.
- Common metrics for health investment: It will mobilize nation states to agree on a set of common metrics that are related to health investments and a return on those investments.
- These investments should aim to reduce the public-private sector gap
Way Forward
- Finally, a global pandemic treaty will not only reduce socioeconomic inequalities across nation states but also enhance a global pandemic preparedness for future health emergencies. India must take the lead in this. Addressing the issues associated with the development and distribution of vaccines will augment the effort to efficiently get vaccines to hundreds of millions in the shortest period of time.
- It is important to ensure fair, affordable, and equitable access to all tools for combating pandemics and, therefore, the need to build a framework for allocation of tools.
