Policies to Impact: January 2023

GHIAA is excited to join you in this new year! A resolution you can keep this year - learn more about equitable access by reviewing our new Equitable Access Toolkit! Keep an eye on our social media as we continue to share the newest commentaries and references available in this new resource.

This month we’re featuring one of the many resources in the new Equitable Access Toolkit, “How Can Equitable Access Policies Result in Measurable Impact?”

This toolkit has been built based on the data in the MAPGuide and the GHIAA team’s experience in negotiating and implementing agreements. We intend that the toolkit will evolve and expand over time based on input from MAPGuide users and availability of new agreements showing examples of alternative approaches. We welcome ongoing constructive dialogue around these materials and encourage you to contact us or fill in our feedback survey to share your thoughts, questions and suggestions.

We will participate in a panel at the AUTM annual meeting in February 2023. Julia Barnes-Weise, JD, CLP will moderate, “Licensing Innovations for Global Impact" on Wednesday, Feb. 22, 10:30-11:45 am CST. The panel will include practical guidance on agreement terms and real-world examples of funding and implementing global partnerships, as well as metrics for measuring the success of those partnerships beyond revenue generation. Julie will be joined by Jordan Jacobson , Deputy Director, Legal, Gates Foundation , Brad Kairdolf , Senior Manager, Commercialization & Technology Management, Baylor College of Medicine and Mark Crowell, RTTP , Executive Entrepreneur in Residence, Eshelman Innovation .

We frequently update the MAPGuide? with new agreements and provisions. We welcome you to contribute your own agreements here. We accept anonymized and redacted content, as well as template and model agreements. Some of our latest additions include:

• CEPI (Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations) – VBI, COVID-19 Vaccine Development Funding Agreement: This COVID-19 Outbreak Response Agreement between the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (“CEPI”) and Variation Biotechnologies Inc. (“VBI”) provides for funding of up to $33 million for development of VBI’s ‘VBI-2905’ enveloped virus-like particle (“eVLP”) vaccine candidate through Phase 1 clinical trials. Under the agreement, VBI makes a number of equitable access commitments under the agreement including registration of the product in priority countries, making sales to COVAX, minimum supply volumes, and affordable and sustainable pricing. VBI also grants CEPI a Public Health License which is triggered under certain circumstances. The agreement sets out a requirement for a Project Continuity Plan which includes the identification of a Trusted Collaborator who would be capable of performing the project activities if VBI is not able to do so, and the selection of a Trusted Manufacturer with geographically dispersed manufacturing sites located in LMICs who will be contracted to produce the project vaccine.

What we’re reading:

• “Stopping epidemics when and where they appear,” by Els Torreele, Michel Kazatchkine, Joanne Lui, Mark Dybul, Mauricio Cardenas, and Sudhvir Singh et al. in the The Lancet Group .
• “Vaccines and the COVID-19 Pandemic: Lessons from Failure and Success” by Scott Duke Kominers and Alex Tabarro in the Oxford Review of Economic Policy
• Equitable Access Contracts: Building Blocks of a Future Global Vaccine Strategy by Ayelet Berman, PhD Berman in EJIL:Talk! The Blog of the European Journal of International Law
• “Pharmaceutical patent law and policy in Africa: a survey of selected SADC member states,” Bryan Mercurio, Tolulope Anthony Adekola, and Chimdessa Fekadu Tsega in Legal Studies.
• “Developing an Omni-Channel Deployment Strategy for COVID-19 Antivirals” by Jubilee Ahazie and Prashant Yadav, Center for Global Development.?
• “The world needs to prepare now to prevent polio resurgence post eradication,” by Amie Batson and Amanda Glassman et al. in BMJ Public Health.

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