Bharat Biotech Vaccine
Fair Pharma Scorecard
Applying human rights to pharma
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The company should publicly commit to human rights in relation to product development and marketing, by adopting an official human rights policy statement recognising the right to the highest attainable standard of health. The company should endeavour to integrate human rights into its strategies, policies, programmes, projects, and activities.
The company should also have a publicly available global access plan for their Covid-19 product, based on human rights standards, with measurable targets and lines of accountability.
GSK signed the Gates Foundation ‘Commitments to Expanded Access for Covid-19 Diagnostics, Therapeutics and Vaccines’. It also states on its website that GSK is committed to supporting global supply.
GSK has published a position statement on human rights, and supports the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights among other human rights documents. GSK has also stated that they believe that ‘governments are responsible for defining and enforcing a legal human rights framework’, but they ‘recognise that we have a role to play in upholding human rights and in addressing adverse human rights impacts where we are in a position to influence.’
The company should constructively engage with international initiatives for the equitable distribution of vaccines and therapeutics, such as the Covid-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) or the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP), and the ACT Accelerator (COVAX). The company should also publicly commit to not enforcing the exclusive rights of Covid-19 related patents, and enter into non-exclusive, transparent licensing agreements for its Covid-19 products with other companies.
GSK does not commit to C-TAP or the MPP.
GSK does not commit to not enforcing the exclusive rights of Covid-19 related patents.
GSK has not committed to supply the ACT Accelerator with its Covid-19 therapeutic.
GSK has a contract manufacturing deal with Samsung Biologics. It is unclear whether this licensing goes further than fill-and-finish.
The company should engage in efforts to further equitable distribution of Covid-19 vaccines/therapeutics, by equitably distributing its supplies globally, devising fair pricing strategies, and making the active ingredient for its product available to other manufacturers. The company should also engage in full technology transfer to other manufacturers, including the necessary transfer of skills, legal components, knowledge and intellectual property. Where applicable, the company should agree to waive rights in regulatory test data, and refrain from enforcing TRIPS+ measures.
There is no evidence that GSK makes the active ingredient for Sotrovimab available to other manufacturers.
GSK has a contract manufacturing deal with Samsung Biologics which does not seem to include technology transfer.
Sotrovimab is priced at 2100 US dollars per course in the US. GSK makes claims of ‘responsible pricing’ on its website; but so far there is no evidence of fair or non-profit pricing.
