Media Releases

G7 failure to tackle hunger crisis will leave millions to starve

June 28, 2022

Responding to news of the US$4.5 billion pledge made by the G7 leaders to tackle global hunger, Max Lawson, Head of Inequality Policy at Oxfam said:

“Faced with the worst hunger crisis in a generation, the G7 have simply failed to take the action that is needed. Many millions will face terrible hunger and starvation as a result.’

‘Instead of doing what is needed, the G7 are leaving millions to starve and cooking the planet.’

‘The G7 say themselves that 323 million people are on the brink of starvation, because of the current crisis, a new record high. Nearly a billion people, 950 million are projected to be hungry in 2022. We need at least US$28.5 billion more from the G7 to finance food and agriculture investments to end hunger and fill the huge gap in UN humanitarian appeals. The US$4.5 billion announced is a fraction of what is needed. The G7 could have done so much more here in Germany to end the food crisis and prevent hunger and starvation worldwide.’

‘The G7 weakening of their commitment to stop public money subsidising planet killing fossil fuels is appalling and makes climate breakdown ever more real. This is further exacerbated by their lack of progress in delivering promised finance to support climate action in developing countries.’

‘The G7 refusal to heed the call of last year’s UN climate summit to strengthen their weak targets to cut emissions sends out a terrible signal to the rest of the World, especially to vulnerable communities already suffering the impacts of the worsening climate crisis.’

Food and hunger

‘Pledging more money is just part of what the G7 could do to end hunger. They could ban biofuels. They could cancel debts of poor nations. They could tax the excess profits of food and energy corporates. Most importantly they could have tackled the economic inequality and climate breakdown that is driving this hunger. They failed to do any of this, despite having the power to do so.’

‘‘For every dollar in aid given, poor countries have to pay back US$2 dollars to their creditors, often banks in New York or London making huge profits. The G7 should have cancelled those debts to enable countries to spend money instead on feeding their people.’

‘The G7 was held in the same location in Germany in 2015, where a commitment was made to lift 500 million people out of hunger. Seven years later and in fact there are as many as 335 million more hungry people in the world. We urgently need new approaches to addressing hunger that start with addressing underlying drivers such as economic inequality and climate breakdown. Current efforts are woefully inadequate.”

‘Corporate profits have soared during COVID-19 and the number of billionaires has increased more in 24 months than it did in 23 years. This food crisis is big business.’

‘The G7 had the opportunity to tax the big winners from the crises. The energy and food corporations are making huge profits, creating 62 new food billionaires. They could have agreed to coordinated windfall taxes to fight this crisis and missed a huge opportunity to do so.’

“What we need to see a clear action plan with a new funding not just from traditional donors, but from companies and others that have profited from the current spike in energy and food prices to address the underlying causes of global food insecurity and hunger. It should be clear that the recently launched Global Alliance for Food Security (GAFS) will complement, rather than undermine existing institutions responsible for global coordination of food and agriculture, including the Committee on World Food Security which plays a key role in policy setting. There is a need to clarify what concrete measures will be proposed under this initiative, and ensure sufficient funding is attached to it to ensure it can deliver.”

“In addition, G7 need to fund the US$46 billion global humanitarian appeal which, despite increasing five-fold in the last decade, is only 20 percent funded today. They should agree to fill this funding gap of US$37 billion immediately.”

Climate

The G7 commitments to largely decarbonise their power sectors by 2035 and their road sector by 2030 point into the right direction but should have been stronger, and a much-needed 2030 coal phase out date is missing.

We welcome the initial steps towards Just Transition Energy Partnerships with Indonesia, India, Senegal and Vietnam as such partnerships can create predictability and reliability. Yet, those partnerships need to be backed up by financial commitments to make them effective, and the design and implementation of such partnerships must involve local communities and vulnerable populations from the beginning, based on truly participatory, inclusive and gender just approaches.

COVID-19

Despite the growing danger of new COVID-19 variants, and the failure to deliver even half of the vaccines they promised a year ago at the Carbis Bay Summit in the UK a year ago. Only 18 percent of the poorest countries are fully vaccinated. The G7 continue to defend the monopolies and intellectual property of their pharmaceutical corporations over supporting developing countries to make their own, generic vaccines.

‘What a difference a year makes. The G7 want us to think COVID-19 is over, and the ongoing global health crisis doesn’t exist. Tell that to the many millions yet to have a single vaccine, and the many still dying from this cruel disease.’

Notes to Editors

West Africa is currently facing its worst food crisis in a decade, with 27 million people going hungry. This number could rise to 38 million – an unprecedented level – unless urgent action is taken.
In East Africa, one person is estimated to be dying of hunger every 48 seconds in drought-ravaged Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, as actions have remained too slow and too limited to prevent the hunger crisis from escalating. The rainfall deficit in the most recent rainy season in these three countries has been the most severe in at least 70 years.
In Yemen and Syria, protracted conflicts have shattered people’s livelihoods. In Yemen, more than 17 million people – over half of the population – don’t have enough food, and pockets of the country are experiencing famine-like conditions. In Syria, six out of 10 Syrians – 12.4 million people – are struggling to put food on the table. This means many families are resorting to extreme measures to cope: going into debt to buy food, taking children out of school to work, and reducing the number of meals they have each day. Marrying off young daughters so there is one less mouth to feed has become another negative coping strategy.
The FAO State of the World’s Food Security report 2021 (page 10) shows that 615 million people were hungry in 2015. The WFP are now talking about as many as 950 million in hunger this year, 2022. The difference between these two is 335 million. When they last met in Germany in 2015, the G7 made the following declaration in their communique:
‘As part of a broad effort involving our partner countries, and international actors, and as a significant contribution to the Post 2015 Development Agenda, we aim to lift 500 million people in developing countries out of hunger and malnutrition by 2030.’
According to the UN OCHA Financial Tracking Service there is a US$37 billion funding shortfall in humanitarian appeals. According to the Ceres2030: Sustainable Solutions to End Hunger report, which sets out a 10-year plan to eradicate hunger, an additional US$330 billion is needed over 10 years and that the donor funding gap over this period is US$140 billion, so US$14 billion per year. Adding US$37 billion and US$14 billion gives us a total of US$51 billion each year.
The G7 share of total aid is around 65 percent, so the G7 share of this figure is US$33 billion. They promised US$4.5 billion, leaving a shortfall of US$28.5 billion.

Oxfam reacts to Supreme Court ruling on abortion

June 25, 2022

In reaction to today’s Supreme Court ruling on abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organsation, Abby Maxman, President and CEO of Oxfam America, made the following statement:

“Today, the Supreme Court has delivered a devastating blow to the human rights of women across this country, declaring that rights to reproductive choice and health, including the right to access safe, legal abortion care, no longer exist in this country.

“While this devastating ruling impacts us all, it will fall hardest on marginalised people – poor women, women of colour, and gender-diverse people. That’s because the right to safe, legal, accessible abortion is fundamentally about reproductive justice rooted in gender, racial, and economic equality. Abortion rights in the United States will be doled out based on the privilege of who you are, where you live, how much money you have.

“Like so many rights and freedoms in this country, abortion access has long been a privilege reserved only for some. With the court removing all federal protections for abortion access, the gulf between those whose rights are real and those whose rights are out of reach, will grow exponentially. Without Roe and Casey, what remains is a disjointed and chaotic patchwork of state laws: some outlawing all abortions, others criminalising recipients and providers, and others protecting abortion access at the state level. What remains is a deepening system of inequality.

“Black and brown women and girls, trans individuals and gender-diverse people, people with disabilities, and people with irregular immigration status – all who already face systemic barriers to reproductive healthcare – will be further marginalised, their lives endangered, their futures at risk.

“The states that stand ready to outlaw abortion because of this ruling are those that already deny many supports and rights to residents. Mississippi, for example, has the highest poverty rate in the US and ranks in our index of states as the third-worst state for workers, and the fourth-worst place in the country to be a working woman. There is no mandate for equal pay, no accommodations for pregnant workers, no protections for workplace breastfeeding, and no form of paid sick leave or family leave.

“When abortion care comes with a criminal penalty, Black and brown pregnant people will be more likely than their white peers to be charged, convicted, and incarcerated, increasing their chances of poverty. Furthermore, a pregnant Black woman who is forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term will be three times more likely to die of pregnancy-related complications than a white woman. The consequences of this decision aren’t academic or theoretical—they are very real.

“Today, I take solace in the belief that Americans fundamentally believe in reproductive and human rights. And this ruling calls on all of us to organise, raise our political voices and right this wrong.”

G7 vaccines failures contribute to 600,000 preventable deaths  

June 25, 2022

Latest data suggests rich countries are likely to have already secured majority of next generation COVID vaccines 

Less than half (49 per cent) of the 2.1 billion COVID vaccine donations promised to poorer countries by G7 countries have been delivered, according to new figures published today by Oxfam and the People’s Vaccine Alliance.  

On the eve of this year’s G7 Summit, taking place in the German Alps, a new analysis shows that had the missing donated doses been shared in 2021, it could have been enough to save almost 600,000 lives in low and middle income countries, the equivalent of one every minute.

The worst offenders are the UK and Canada, who have failed to deliver anywhere near the number of vaccines they promised. Just 39 per cent of the 100 million doses the UK pledged to deliver by the end of this month have actually been delivered. While the deadline to meet their respective commitments isn’t until the end of the year, only 30 per cent of Canada’s 50.7 million doses and 46 per cent of the 1.2 billion pledged by the US have been delivered. So-called ‘Team Europe’ have collectively delivered just 56 per cent of the 700 million doses promised by the middle of 2022 and Japan has delivered 64 per cent of the 60 million doses it said it would send.  

Latest data from Airfinity suggests that rich nations may have already secured over half (55 per cent) of the new generation of Omicron-specific mRNA COVID-19 vaccines being developed by Moderna and Pfizer/ BioNTech. This is even before they have been approved for use, making it likely that many developing countries will yet again be left at the back of the queue. 

Max Lawson, Head of Inequality Policy at Oxfam and Co-Chair of the People’s Vaccine Alliance, said: “On every level, rich nations have massively betrayed poor countries when it comes to COVID vaccines. First, they stockpiled all the supply for themselves, then they promised to donate their leftovers, but hundreds of millions of these doses never materialised. 

“Rich nations are already hoarding the new generation of Omicron specific vaccines, whilst people in poorer countries will be forced to continue to face new variants with vaccines that are increasingly ineffective. The only way to fix this is to give nations the rights to make their own, not rely on rich countries to pass on doses they no longer need and deliver too late for the millions who have died.” 

New data published yesterday by Imperial College London found that 599,300 deaths could have been averted in 2021 had 40 per cent of people in all countries been fully vaccinated. The billion missing doses that G7 countries failed to deliver would have been enough to reach this target. Nearly all these preventable deaths were in low- and middle-income countries.  

To date only 14 per cent of people in low-income countries and 18 per cent of people on the African continent are fully vaccinated – far from the target to have 70 per cent coverage in all nations by the middle of the year.  Despite such low vaccine coverage, the Imperial College research found COVID vaccines have saved 446,400 lives in Africa and 180,300 in low-income countries

At the same time, rich nations led by the EU and UK have forced through a text at the WTO which has failed to waive intellectual property on vaccines, treatments and technology that would have enabled developing countries to produce their own generic vaccines. Instead, the text adds even more bureaucratic hurdles and further protects the hugely profitable monopolies of firms such as Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna. The People’s Vaccine Alliance is calling on all countries facing shortages of vaccines, tests and treatments to save lives and end the pandemic by using all trade rule flexibilities available and circumventing WTO rules if necessary. They say the G7 and other rich countries must not stand in their way.

The campaign groups also say that the model of leaving developing countries to rely on donations in order to vaccinate people is completely flawed and actually leads to frustration and mistrust.  

Julia Kosgei, Policy Advisor at The People’s Vaccine Alliance said: “Hundreds of thousands of lives have been saved in Africa by the vaccines, but so many more deaths could have been prevented. Vaccination programs have worked best when doses have arrived on time, allowing governments to plan and scale up distribution. But many countries waited a year to get their first doses. When doses finally arrived, they came all at once, often close to their expiry date, which is totally unmanageable and unfair for countries that have already struggling health systems. 

“Developing countries do not want to have to wait for leftovers, they want the reliability and dignity of being able to produce their own doses. It is a disgrace that rich countries stalled negotiations on an IP waiver to scale up vaccine production across the world so that pharmaceutical corporations could maximise profits while people died without access. To add insult to injury they couldn’t even be bothered to ensure timely access to the doses they didn’t even need. 

“Rich countries have demonstrated that they cannot be trusted to act in the interests of public health for everyone, everywhere – it’s time for leaders from the global south to take matters into their own hands. We hope that governments will do whatever is needed to protect their populations – whether that is using flexibilities in global intellectual property rules or circumventing them to save lives. Rich countries must not get in their way.” 

Previous research by the People’s Vaccine Alliance found that vaccine monopolies are making it five times more expensive to vaccinate the world, while Moderna and Pfizer / BioNTech are making over US$1,000 profit every second from COVID vaccines. 

Notes to editors: 

On Saturday 25 June an Oxfam ‘Big Heads’ photo opportunity will be taking place from 10.30am local time in Munich. Campaigners dressed as G7 leaders in hiking outfits will have to choose the right path to fight the COVID pandemic, standing at a big signpost with two directions, towards “Corporate profits” or “Saving lives”. For more information, please see the Media Advisory: https://oxfam.app.box.com/s/eg10zdy3w7x7rwbwwnouvx50ey2u4klz 

G7 donations 

The figures for the deliveries of donated vaccines to date were sourced from Airfinity’s non-public database, on 9^th June 2022. Pledges are sourced below and are a combination of the pledges made at the 2021 G7 summit as well as subsequent commitments and only includes physical dose donations. 1,071,932,390 pledged Covid-19 doses are yet to be delivered. 

Country name	Total deliveries to date of COVID-19 vaccine doses	Pledged	%	By when	Pledge source
Canada	15,441,410	50,700,000	30%	End of 2022	ⁱ
Japan	38,477,570	60,000,000	64%	Not stated	ⁱⁱ
United Kingdom	39,090,930	100,000,000	39%	By June 2022	ⁱⁱⁱ
United States	550,668,340	1,200,000,000	46%	before 2023	^iv
Team Europe	395,089,360	700,000,000	56%	mid-2022	^v
Total	1,038,767,610	2,110,700,000	49%

Country	Delivered	Pledged	%	By when	Pledge source
France	67,943,110	120,000,000	57%	Middle of 2022	^vi
Germany	116,316,360	175,000,000	66%	End of 2022	^vii
Italy	56,112,160	100,700,000	56%	Not stated	^viii

Team Europe is the vaccine initiative that includes all EU Member States as well as in Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. Individual EU countries have made their own pledges which are part of the 700 million dose target. 

Preventable deaths 

A new study published on 23 June by Imperial College London, found that between 8^th December 2020 to 8^th December 2021, 599,300 additional deaths would have been averted if countries had met the WHO target of 40% of all populations being fully vaccinated.  

Income group	Number of deaths that could have been averted at 40% target
High Income	20
Upper middle income	51,110
Lower middle income	347,500
Low income	200,000

There are 525,600 minutes in a year and so there were 1.14 preventable deaths per minute in low- and middle-income countries.  Taking into account those who are partially and fully vaccinated, according to data from Our World in Data, analyzed by Oxfam, 961,963,161 doses were needed in low- and middle-income countries at the end of 2022 to reach the 40% target – assuming everyone has two vaccine doses. The missing doses pledge by G7 countries is 1,071,932,390. The deaths averted assumes that the G7 would have met their pledges during 2021 – many of the pledges are for delivery by the end of 2022. 

Omicron specific vaccines  

Analysis of the vaccine orders made with vaccine manufactures and projected production of new generation Omicron-specific mRNA vaccines for 2022 according to Airfinity found an estimated 61% of Pfizer / BioNTech’s projected 409 million new Omicron-specific mRNA vaccines and 36% of Moderna’s projected 113 million new generation Omicron-specific mRNA vaccines will ship to high-income countries – assuming new vaccines produced this year are distributed in the same proportions as overall 2022 supply proportions – for a total of 55% of overall supply of new generation mRNA COVID-19 vaccines going to high-income countries in 2022.  

Cost of vaccine monopolies  

The Great Vaccine Robbery report sets out the excessive prices being charged by some pharmaceutical companies for Covid-19 vaccines.  Oxfam calculated that Pfizer, BioNTech and Moderna make US$1,000 profit every second.

G7 must pursue windfall taxes on excess corporate ‘pandemic profits’ and cancel poor country debts to fund fight against hunger

June 24, 2022

The G7 must pursue windfall taxes on excess corporate profits including from those making huge returns from surging food and energy prices. The revenues can be used to fund an end to global hunger and to tackle climate change.

The G7 meets this week in Germany with the world in deep crisis. Developing countries, still reeling from the impact of COVID-19 with their populations not yet fully vaccinated, are now being bankrupted by rapidly rising food and energy prices. Billions of people are struggling to buy food and millions are now facing acute hunger and famine-like conditions.

Oxfam is calling on G7 leaders to set out a properly funded plan to tackle the global food crisis. They should also address their failure to get the whole world is vaccinated against COVID-19, despite promising to do so a year ago.

Rising interest rates in rich nations are fuelling the debt crisis, with many countries facing default or crippling repayments. In 2022 the debt servicing for the world’s poorest countries is estimated at US$43 billion. In 2021, debt represented 171 percent of all spending on healthcare, education and social protection combined for low-income countries. Oxfam is calling on the G7 to immediately cancel 2022 and 2023 debt payments for all the low and middle-income countries that require it.

New Oxfam research shows that a 90 percent windfall tax on the excess profits made by G7’s largest corporations during the pandemic could generate almost US$430 billion. This could fully fund the shortfalls on all existing humanitarian appeals and a 10-year plan to end hunger, while also raising enough for a one-off payment of over US$3,000 to the poorest 10 percent of the population of the G7 countries to help cover the rising cost of living.

The G7 are proposing a new initiative called the ‘Global Alliance for Food Security’ to be launched at the leaders’ summit. Although the plan is promising, they launched a similar plan in Germany in 2015 to reduce the level of hungry people by 500 million, by 2030, but have so far failed to deliver the funding promised for it.

“This global hunger crisis, coming on top of the pandemic, is catastrophic. The G7 have a chance to show ordinary people that they are on their side, and not that of the corporates and creditors making huge excessive profits from these multiple crises. The G7 must implement a coordinated initiative of windfall taxes and debt cancellation to fully fund an action plan to end world hunger,” said Oxfam International Executive Director, Gabriela Bucher.

The G7 need to double the amount of aid they provide for agriculture, food security and nutrition, amounting to an additional US$14bn per year. At the same time, they need to fully fund the US$46 billion United Nations global humanitarian appeal, which is less than 20 percent funded today.

Oxfam research shows that corporations in the energy, food and pharmaceutical sectors – where monopolies are especially common – are posting record-high profits, even as wages have barely budged and workers struggle with decades-high prices and COVID-19. The fortunes of food and energy billionaires have risen by US$453 billion in the last two years, equivalent to US$1 billion every two days. Five of the largest energy companies (BP, Shell, Total Energies, Exxon and Chevron) are together making US$2,600 profit every second. There are now 62 new food billionaires.

The Ukraine crisis has had a huge impact on food prices but these are fuelled by long-standing inequalities and failures in the global food system. Equally the COVID-19 pandemic and the climate crisis have deeply harmed the ability of poor people and poor nations to cope. Between April 2020 and December 2021, wheat prices had increased by 80 percent.

“Hunger thrives on inequality and inaction. Across all countries – as food and energy costs spiral – it is the poorest and most marginalized people who are faced with the most desperate choices. In the poorest countries, the cost-of-living crisis has become a test-of-survival. The G7 must react to the most fundamental of asks we can ever make of our political leaders – help to feed people and stop them dying,” Bucher said.

Agencies like Oxfam have been sounding the alarm about East Africa – where one person is likely dying of hunger every 48 seconds and the rains have recently failed again – but also in West Africa, which has been hit by its worst food crisis in a decade and where 27 million people are now going hungry. Hunger is stalking other countries too in Africa, the Middle East and Latin America – driven by inequality, climate change, the effects of COVID-19, conflict, poverty, and underinvestment in agriculture, aid and other essential services.

The G7 also needs to confront its failure to do its part in vaccinating the world against COVID-19. Just 18 percent of people in the poorest countries are fully vaccinated while the G7 have defended the monopolies of pharmaceutical corporations against allowing developing countries to manufacture their own vaccines. After years of delay, last week at the WTO ministerial, G7 nations forced through a deeply inadequate agreement on vaccines and intellectual property that will fail to support production in developing countries.

Vulnerable communities in lower-income countries are facing the worst consequences of the climate crisis. Emissions are rising, yet the targets offered by countries under the Paris Agreement to cut emissions to keep warming below the critical 1.5°C threshold are insufficient. Despite a call from last year’s UN climate summit to increase emission targets, the G7 have shown no willingness to heed the call.

Developed countries, including the G7, continue to miss their 2009 promise to provide the annual US$100 billion in climate finance for mitigation and adaptation for lower income countries. The G7 should commit to deliver on the goal set by COP26 to double their provision of adaptation financing by 2025 – to strengthen long-term resilience and address climate-induced hunger, and to make clear how they will do so.

Notes to editors

To calculate the excess profit tax, Oxfam looked at the profits of the companies listed on the Forbes 2000 list of the largest companies in the world based on sales, profits, assets, and market value. The database was accessed from an open dataset repository (2017-2021 and 2022), which was then spot checked and cleaned to the best of our ability, for example by standardising naming conventions. The companies who are based in G7 countries, that have been on the list from 2017-2022, and made a profit for each of those years, were selected and the average profit between 2017-2020 (considered the pre-pandemic period as the data cut off is in April) were subtracted from the average 2021-2022 profits to give an excess profit total. Only those who increased their profit above 10 percent of their pre-pandemic average were included. In total there are 360 companies in the cohort.

The total excess profit is US$477,226,450,000 which taxed at a 90 percent rate would create US$429,503,805,000 in revenue. According to the UN OCHA Financial Tracking Service there is a US$37 billion funding shortfall in humanitarian appeals. According to the Ceres2030: Sustainable Solutions to End Hunger report, which sets out a 10-year plan to eradicate hunger, an additional US$330 billion is needed over 10 years and that the donor funding gap over this period is US$140 billion. The population of G7 countries is 770 million, according to the UN. A one-off payment of US$3,253 to the poorest 10 percent would cost US$253 billion.

Israel’s blockade of Gaza hits 15 years with no diplomatic resolution in sight

June 21, 2022

The United Nations and all other humanitarian actors have spent 15 years delivering humanitarian support to 2.1m Palestinians blockaded inside Gaza, and yet, there is still no sustained collective political action or will to resolve it.

In those 15 years, the international community has spent an estimated US$5.7 billion in Gaza just to help keep an incredibly resilient population afloat, in impossible conditions.

“The humanitarian relief effort has long become a permanent operation. We are collectively forced into being de facto enablers of an open-air prison,” said Oxfam International Executive Director, Gabriela Bucher, on marking 15 years of the blockade.

“Today, seven out of ten people in Gaza depend on aid. This must change. We look to the UN Secretary-General personally to make the immediate lifting of the Gaza blockade a priority,” Bucher said. “Israel’s control is total, extending down to levels that are frankly ridiculous and punishing – like banning Gaza’s export of tomatoes unless they have had their green tops removed, so they can’t be kept as fresh”.

This month, Oxfam joins a civil society campaign, #OpenUpGaza15. “We need to stop the tragedy of Gaza from continuing to drain all the joy and aspiration of its youth, year upon year. It is imperative that we help the next generation not to be lost to the blockade. Over 800,000 young Palestinians have spent their entire lives trapped within Gaza. They have known nothing else,” she said.

These young people face a 63 percent probability of having no job. For girls it’s even worse – four out of five won’t find paid work. Gaza has one of the highest unemployment rates in the world.

“Most all of Israel’s restrictions are motivated by politics, not security. Palestinian families in Gaza are being collectively and illegally punished,” said Oxfam’s Country Director, Shane Stevenson. “Israel bans the export of date paste, cookies, and French fries. It has forbidden 3G and 4G phone data and there’s no PayPal. This is not a place where a young person can be expected to flourish and find happiness.”

#OpenUpGaza15 will feature the everyday stories from 15 young people about their daily deprivations, curbs, and constraints with which they have to deal just to pursue their lives and their interests.

Ahmad Abu Dagga, 15, excels in sciences but fears that he will finish his 12 years of school without ever seeing a microscope in his school laboratory.

Alaa Abu Sleih, 23, was born with a physical disability. A few years ago, the control panel of his wheel chair broke down and he cannot get a new one. The chair tyres are wearing out and he worries how he will get around.

Oxfam’s humanitarian and development efforts in Gaza are all constantly undermined by Israel’s suffocating restrictions on services and the movement of resources and people. 97 percent of Gaza’s piped water is not fit to drink and electricity supply is restricted to 12 hours per day.

“The UN and its member states must become the diplomatic power brokers needed to end this blockade now,” Stevenson said. “All sides must commit to a time-bound plan with actions and strong accountability mechanisms. We refuse to accept that all the effort made to maintain the blockade for 15 years can’t instead be harnessed for good and to consign it to history.”

WTO agrees a deal on patents for Covid-19 vaccines – Oxfam reacts

June 17, 2022

Responding to news that governments at the World Trade Organization (WTO) have agreed a deal on patents for COVID-19 vaccines in developing countries, Max Lawson, Co-Chair of the People’s Vaccine Alliance and Head of Inequality Policy at Oxfam, said:

“This is absolutely not the broad intellectual property waiver the world desperately needs to ensure access to vaccines and treatments for everyone, everywhere. The EU, UK, US, and Switzerland blocked that text. This so-called compromise largely reiterates developing countries’ existing rights to override patents in certain circumstances. And it tries to restrict even that limited right to countries which do not already have capacity to produce COVID-19 vaccines. Put simply, it is a technocratic fudge aimed at saving reputations, not lives.

“The conduct of rich countries at the WTO has been utterly shameful. The EU has blocked anything that resembles a meaningful intellectual property waiver. The UK and Switzerland have used negotiations to twist the knife and make any text even worse. And the US has sat silently in negotiations with red lines designed to limit the impact of any agreement.

“South Africa and India have led a twenty-month fight for the rights of developing countries to manufacture and access vaccines, tests, and treatments. It is disgraceful that rich countries have prevented the WTO from delivering a meaningful agreement on vaccines and have dodged their responsibility to take action on treatments while people die without them.

“There are some worrying new obligations in this text that could actually make it harder for countries to access vaccines in a pandemic. We hope that developing countries will now take bolder action to exercise their rights to override vaccine intellectual property rules and, if necessary, circumvent them to save lives.”

Notes to editors

Spokespeople are available for interviews in Geneva, where the WTO is hosting its 12th ministerial conference.

In October 2020, South Africa and India proposed a broad waiver of the Trade Related aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS) agreement covering COVID-19 vaccines, tests, and treatments. The EU, UK, and Switzerland blocked that proposal. The US supported an IP waiver for only vaccines. The final text agreed is a watered down waiver of one small clause of the TRIPS agreement relating to exports of vaccines. It also contains new barriers that are not in the original TRIPS agreement text.