Regional production of vaccines and other pandemic-related products – and sharing the technical know-how to enable this – features strongly in the much-anticipated first draft of the global pandemic treaty proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO) to guide future pandemics. WHO member states will be briefed on the conceptual “zero-sum” draft on Friday in […] Continue reading ->
Biotherapeutic products represent a new therapeutic revolution in disease treatment and are by far the fastest-growing segment of the pharmaceutical industry – yet the recent biosimilar guidelines issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) are myopic, inconsistent or vague about some well-established scientific issues Biosimilar products include recombinant proteins and hormones, monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), cytokines, […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged governments worldwide to step up the supervision of vaccine manufacture and distribution, especially when public funding is used in vaccine R&D or manufacture, so as to prioritise essential vaccines and ensure they are distributed equitably.  The global health agency’s call to governments came as it released its annual […] Continue reading ->
The Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO) and Developing Countries Vaccine Manufacturers’ Network (DCVMN) have thrown their weight behind the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA) proposal to improve access to vaccines in future pandemics. The proposal, known as the Berlin Declaration, outlines how the pharmaceutical industry would reserve an allocation of real-time production of […] Continue reading ->
Midway through last year, the head of the Africa Vaccine Acquisition Task Team, Strive Masiyiwa, angrily accused the global COVID-19 vaccine acquisition platform, COVAX, of misleading African countries about its ability to procure vaccines for them. Masiyiwa’s bitter remarks came after months of Africans watching Europeans and North Americans being vaccinated against COVID-19 while no […] Continue reading ->
NEW DELHI – When India’s Aam Admi Party (AAP) won elections in the northern state of Punjab in March, decisively wresting power away from the Indian National Congress (INC) and defeating the nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, clean air advocates and activists were optimistic that the burning of crop stubble by Punjab farmers – the biggest […] Continue reading ->