Pandemic Neoliberalism and Struggles for Vaccine Equity

I analyze the development of what I call “pandemic neoliberalism,” where neoliberals strive to regulate global public health through neoliberal institutions, particularly intellectual property law and the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (TRIPS) within the World Trade Organization (WTO). During the COVID-19 pandemic, pandemic neoliberals used the TRIPS Agreement to define vaccines and therapeutics as intellectual property. They employed the dominant form of intellectual property law involving patents on vaccines and therapeutics, which included a wide range of trade secrets and tacit knowledge owned and controlled by major pharmaceutical firms, states and other institutions in the global North. In order to challenge this regime, states in the global South advocated vaccine equity, seeking to develop local capacities to manufacture and distribute vaccines.

Pandemic neoliberalism developed through interconnected conflicts between the global North and South over intellectual property law. They arose in October 2020, when the Indian and South African WTO delegations requested the WTO to temporarily waive TRIPS restrictions on COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics. WTO delegates from the global North opposed this request as an infringement on intellectual property. They delayed and ultimately restricted access to lifesaving vaccines and therapeutics.

Simultaneously, related struggles emerged over vaccine technology, production and distribution. Vaccine equity advocates at the World Health Organization (WHO) established an mRNA Technology Transfer Hub in South Africa to expand vaccine production in the global South, particularly Africa. The Hub posed an alternative to the dominant model of drug development under intellectual property law that relied on patents, exclusive licensing, and the profit motive.

I explore these two interconnected conflicts between pandemic neoliberals and vaccine equity advocates between 2020 and 2024. I evaluate prospects for “technological sovereignty” over vaccines, diagnostics and therapeutics. Such sovereignty involves local ownership or control over these technologies to prepare for future pandemics.