A suggestion to waive patent restrictions on Covid-19 vaccines has been rejected by Bill Gates, who said he doesn’t believe intellectual property has anything to do with the drawn-out global effort to rein in the pandemic.
Vaccines developed by pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer and Moderna enjoy global protection under the World Trade Organization (WTO). Considering the scarcity of the medicines, there have been increasing calls from countries like India and South Africa, international relief organizations and public figures to waive those protections so that poorer countries can get better access to the medicines.
However, one of the most publicized figures in the global vaccination campaign, Bill Gates, apparently believes it’s a bad idea. When asked by Sky News’ Sophy Ridge if stripping intellectual property protections from vaccine recipes would be helpful, the founder of Microsoft responded with an emphatic “No.”
