Evan Vucci/AP Photo
President Joe Biden meets with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the Oval Office of the White House, July 15, 2021, in Washington.
In her White House meetings, Angela Merkel did not give any ground on Biden’s request to get with the program and allow the world to get cheap COVID vaccines.
To Biden’s great credit—the behind-the-scenes hero here is U.S. Trade Rep Katherine Tai—the administration reversed the U.S. position in May and supported a waiver of the trade agreement on intellectual property known as TRIPS that prohibits other manufacturers from producing patented vaccines.
More than 140 nations, including other major EU members led by France, support the waiver. Germany is the main holdout.
A waiver will allow other countries, notably India, which already produces a large share of the world’s vaccines, to produce cheap COVID vaccines using the processes created by Pfizer or Moderna or Johnson & Johnson without having to pay licensing fees.
If ever there were an emergency moment for such a waiver, it is now, as we are already seeing another upsurge in the pandemic. So what’s with Merkel? She has been a good humanitarian, taking real political risks to admit large numbers of refugees. She will also be leaving office in September, so she has nothing to lose politically by supporting the waiver.
Evidently, Markel is acting for the German company BioNTech, which developed much of the science behind the vaccine now being produced and marketed mainly by Pfizer. But if that’s the case, Merkel may be getting lousy advice on what’s at stake.
The reality is that under its deal with Pfizer, BioNTech has rights to sell the vaccine mainly in Germany; Pfizer bought most worldwide rights, though recent press accounts refer to possible BioNTech deals to sell to Indonesia and Thailand. If a TRIPS waiver is approved, all these profit opportunities vanish.
Ironically, all this comes at a moment when Pfizer is disparaging the efficacy of its own vaccine, in order to compel people to get booster shots. In the industry’s fantasy, these would be at a “post-pandemic price” of $150 a dose or more.
These drugmakers were handsomely subsidized by taxpayers, and have already made windfall profits in the tens of billions. At his White House meetings, Biden had other fish to fry with Merkel, including a common front vis-à-vis China. But the West doesn’t have a great reputation in the Third World right now; and China, which is already supplying cheap vaccines to the global South is making headway with its claims that its model is superior to the West’s.
The U.S. needs to keep the pressure on Merkel; and Merkel, a pastor’s daughter, needs to look to her own conscience.
