The World Health Assembly, the governing body of the World Health Organization, has agreed on a draft resolution that would ensure countries have access to patent rights for COVID-19 drugs, diagnostics and vaccines, STAT reported.
The draft resolution discusses a voluntary pool that would collect patent rights, regulatory test data and other information that could be shared between countries for developing medical products.
Countries would still have to issue compulsory licenses to obtain lower-cost drugs, STAT reported. Compulsory licenses are given to a company to allow it to copy a patented drug without the consent of the patent holder.
Compulsory licenses have been a source of disagreement between the pharmaceutical industry and low- and middle-income countries, and the U.S. has historically been against the licenses, according to STAT.
Read the full article here.