Africa should tackle failures in technology sharing
Universities in Africa must be more vocal about the failures of higher education institutions in the Global North to challenge the status quo of innovation- and technology-sharing that is denying millions access to life-saving treatments, Sarai Keestra, a research coordinator of the Universities Allied for Essential Medicines in the United Kingdom has told
University World News.
In an e-mail exchange following a commentary she wrote in
BMJ Global Health she said: “African universities can hold universities in the Global North to account by actively voicing their concern about the way universities are currently contributing to preventable deaths and suffering when they fail to challenge the status quo of a biomedical innovation system that denies access to life-saving treatments for millions.”
May 12, 2021
Over nearly two decades, a new study has found, government agencies have given at least £175 million ($248 million) to develop ChAdOx, a vaccine delivery system developed by scientists at Oxford University. Charities like the Wellcome Trust have given at least a further £53 million. As much as 99% of the total disclosed funding for ChAdOx research came from public or philanthropic money. And yet ChAdOx now sits at the heart of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine, and the company is free to profit from it at will.
To be sure, AstraZeneca has said it will sell these vaccines at no profit to the developing world “in perpetuity,” and at no profit in the West until it decides the pandemic is over. But that could be as soon as July after which AstraZeneca can cash in heavily on these years of publicly funded research, just as its competitors, such as Pfizer and Moderna, are already doing.