Hyderabad: City-based NGO Association for Economic Empowerment of the Marginalised (ASEEM) on Sunday organised a campaign against vaccine apartheid.
The organisation also highlighted the issue of major pharma companies exercising monopolies over the COVID-19 vaccine’s distribution. It has called for free, fair equitable access to the vaccine in order to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The organisers further remarked that certain pharma companies are backed by major business houses.
ASEEM organised the protest in collaboration with South Asia Alliance for Poverty Eradication (SAAPE) with the slogan, “No one is safe until everyone is safe.” The NGO expressed solidarity with the demand for vaccination equality among the least developed countries.
“Developed nations must support the proposal in the WTO Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property
Rights (WTO TRIPS) for a temporary waiver of IP rights with regard to copyright, industrial designs and patents, until the majority of the world’s population, receives effective vaccines and develops immunity to COVID-19. This should not be limited to vaccines, but include medical equipment, diagnostics and therapeutics,” said a press release from ASEEM.
