The 21 leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation met last Friday, 16th of July, (albeit virtually) to pledge urgent action to tackle the health and economic effects of the Covid 19 pandemic.
“If we remove patent barriers and use generic medicines to treat the entire world, we can save $26 billion and save 240,000 lives.” Listen to @ITPCglobal‘s Othoman Mellouk explaining to @BBC on how patent restrictions stop the world reaching the @UNAIDS 2030 target.
Podcast available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w172y47m2bp224n
After the virtual meeting chaired by New Zealand, the leader issued a joint statement on saying the pandemics continues to have damaging effects on our region’s people and economies.
“We will only overcome this health emergency by accelerating equitable access to safe, effective, quality-assured, and affordable COVID-19 vaccines,” they said.
