Tournament: SeptOct LD | Round: 1 | Opponent: All | Judge: Any
Contention One: Inequality
Contention one is Vaccine Inequality
- Global health inequality threatens progress in the fight against COVID-19, which magnifies vaccine resistant mutations
Fink 7-30-21
(Jenni, staff writer, https://www.newsweek.com/who-warns-world-blind-understanding-covid-spread-hurting-ability-end-pandemic-1614722)
A lack of testing for COVID-19 in parts of the world is preventing
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We can test for it and we can treat it," Ghebreyesus said.
2. IP protections are the vital internal link to reduce vaccine inequality. Empirics disprove all of the negative’s pro-patent arguments.
Kumar, PhD, 7-12-21
(Rajeesh, Associate Fellow Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis, https://www.idsa.in/issuebrief/wto-trips-waiver-covid-vaccine-rkumar-120721)
In October 2020, India and South Africa had submitted a proposal to the World
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not expedient in a public health crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic.
3. Beyond the impacts of vaccine inequality, there are secondary impacts of war. Continued COVID spread causes great power war and is the death knell of the liberal international order due to diversion, nationalism, and psychology.
Kitfield 20
(James, the only three-time winner of the prestigious Gerald R. Ford Award for Distinguished Reporting on National Defense, https://breakingdefense.com/2020/05/will-covid-19-kill-the-liberal-world-order/, 5-22)
For a brief moment it seemed that the worst global pandemic in a century might
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dangerous period when cooler heads may not prevail among the great power leaders.”
4. This makes the risk of U.S.-China nuclear war extremely high, even if you are skeptical. Chinese planners don’t believe nuclear weapons are usable and US decisionmakers are too confident in limited nuclear war.
Fiona CUNNINGHAM Poli Sci @ GW AND Taylor FRAVEL Arthur and Ruth Sloan Professor of Political Science and Director of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ’19 “Dangerous Confidence? Chinese Views on Nuclear Escalation” International Security 44 (2) p. EBSCO
Chinese views of nuclear escalation are key to assessing the potential for nuclear escalation in
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but it investigates only one of multiple pathways to nuclear escalation.11
Thus I propose the following plan: Member nations of the World Trade Organization ought to reduce intellectual property protections for medicines for COVID-19.
This plan comes from:
Communication from India and South Africa to the WTO 20
(WAIVER FROM CERTAIN PROVISIONS OF THE TRIPS AGREEMENT FOR THE PREVENTION,
CONTAINMENT AND TREATMENT OF COVID-19 https://docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages/SS/directdoc.aspx?filename=q:/IP/C/W669.pdfandOpen=True, 10-2)
5. An effective response to COVID-19 pandemic requires rapid access to affordable medical products
including diagnostic kits, medical masks, other personal protective equipment and ventilators, as
well as vaccines and medicines for the prevention and treatment of patients in dire need.
6. The outbreak has led to a swift increase in global demand with many countries facing acute
shortages, constraining the ability to effectively respond to the outbreak. Shortages of these
products has put the lives of health and other essential workers at risk and led to many avoidable
deaths. It is also threatening to prolong the COVID-19 pandemic. The longer the current global crisis
persist, the greater the socio-economic fallout, making it imperative and urgent to collaborate
internationally to rapidly contain the outbreak.
7. As new diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines for COVID-19 are developed, there are significant
concerns, how these will be made available promptly, in sufficient quantities and at affordable price
to meet global demand. Critical shortages in medical products have also put at grave risk patients
suffering from other communicable and non-communicable diseases.
8. To meet the growing supply-demand gap, several countries have initiated domestic production
of medical products and/or are modifying existing medical products for the treatment of COVID-19
patients. The rapid scaling up of manufacturing globally is an obvious crucial solution to address the
timely availability and affordability of medical products to all countries in need.
9. There are several reports about intellectual property rights hindering or potentially hindering
timely provisioning of affordable medical products to the patients.3
It is also reported that some
WTO Members have carried out urgent legal amendments to their national patent laws to expedite
the process of issuing compulsory/government use licenses.
10. Beyond patents, other intellectual property rights may also pose a barrier, with limited options
to overcome those barriers. In addition, many countries especially developing countries may face
institutional and legal difficulties when using flexibilities available in the Agreement on Trade-Related
Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement). A particular concern for countries with
insufficient or no manufacturing capacity are the requirements of Article 31bis and consequently the
cumbersome and lengthy process for the import and export of pharmaceutical products.
- Internationally, there is an urgent call for global solidarity, and the unhindered global sharing
of technology and know-how in order that rapid responses for the handling of COVID-19 can be put
in place on a real time basis.
12. In these exceptional circumstances, we request that the Council for TRIPS recommends, as
early as possible, to the General Council a waiver from the implementation, application and
enforcement of Sections 1, 4, 5, and 7 of Part II of the TRIPS Agreement in relation to prevention,
containment or treatment of COVID-19.
13. The waiver should continue until widespread vaccination is in place globally, and the majority
of the world's population has developed immunity hence we propose an initial duration of x years
from the date of the adoption of the waiver.
14. We request that the Council for TRIPS urgently recommends to the General Council adoption of
the annexed decision text.
Contention two is solvency.
- The plan creates a new, goldilocks patent law that exempts pandemics from intellectual property protections.
Lindsey, JD Harvard, 21
(Brink, 6-3-21, Vice President - Niskanen Center, Why intellectual property and pandemics don’t mix https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2021/06/03/why-intellectual-property-and-pandemics-dont-mix/)
Waiving patent protections is certainly no panacea. What is needed most urgently is a
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up by blocking competitors and raising prices pushes in the completely wrong direction.
2. Critics of the IP waiver are wrong- it’s the most effective way to combat COVID inequality.
Erfani et al, 21
(Parsa Erfani, Fogarty global health scholar1 2, Agnes Binagwaho, vice chancellor2, Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh, vice president3, Muhammad Yunus, chair4, Paul Farmer, professor57, Vanessa Kerry, associate professor810 Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA 2University of Global Health Equity, Rwanda 3Sierra Leone 4Yunus Centre, Bangladesh 5Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA 6Division of Global Health Equity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, USA 7Partners In Health, USA 8Seed Global Health, USA 9Program in Global Public Policy and Social Change, Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA 10Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, USA Intellectual property waiver for covid-19 vaccines will advance global health equity BMJ 2021; 374 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.n1837 (Published 03 August 2021) Cite this as: BMJ 2021;374:n1837 https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n1837.full)
The barrier to adequate vaccine supply today is not lack of vaccine options, nor
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other people’s” problem. It is not. It is our problem.
3. Removing IP protections will increase production, diversify supply, and spur innovations that protect against future pandemics.
Human Rights Watch 6-3-21 https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/06/03/seven-reasons-eu-wrong-oppose-trips-waiver#
Intellectual property is currently a barrier to swiftly scaling up and diversifying the production of
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and safety for vaccines, which have a very stringent process for approval.
4. Waiving IPR is the vital internal link to equitable distribution. Patents are a key deterrent to expanded manufacturing capabilities.
Kang, PhD, et al., 7-14-21
(Hyo Yoon Kang is Reader in Law at the University of Kent. Aisling McMahon is Assistant Professor of Law in the Department of Law at Maynooth University. Graham Dutfield is Professor of International Governance at the University of Leeds. Luke McDonagh is Assistant Professor of Law in the Department of Law at the LSE. Siva Thambisetty is Associate Professor of Law in the Department of Law at the LSE. https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/covid19-trips-waiver/)
The temporary TRIPS waiver – as proposed by India and South Africa and supported by
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fulfil this promise and, in so doing, to end the pandemic.
The optional framework our novices will sometimes read is consequentialism + foreign policy prudence. It's nothing fancy.