Main negotiators reach 'outcome' on COVID vaccine IP waiver, WTO says

The four main parties to negotiations on an intellectual property waiver for COVID-19 vaccines have prepared an 'outcome document' for approval by the broader membership, the WTO said on Tuesday, with its chief hoping for a final deal by June. WTO director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who has made vaccine equity her top priority since taking office in 2021, has been working for months to broker a compromise between the United States, the European Union, India and South Africa to break an 18-month-long impasse. 'What the discussions were aiming at was coming up with something workable,' Okonjo-Iweala told Reuters, saying she hoped the WTO's 164 members would finalise and approve the proposal by a major conference in June. 'This will advance the discussion and dialogue. For the next pandemic or a flare up of this one, this is hugely important,' she said. The document showed that there were still unresolved areas in the draft deal, including on the duration of the waiver's application which could be either three or five years.