2022 part1

48/ WTO, WHO, WIPO to hold workshop on access, use of pandemic-related information resources

14 FEBRUARY 2022

A virtual workshop jointly organized by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the WTO on 28 February will provide an overview of particular COVID-19-related information resources.

The workshop aims to enhance understanding of the characteristics, potential uses and limitations of particular information sources related to COVID-19. A range of experts will discuss information resources containing the following types of data: epidemiological and other health-related issues; clinical trials; technological developments; intellectual property rights (IPRs); and manufacturing and distribution of and access to technologies. Experts will also look at vaccination, diagnostics, treatment rates and cross-border flows of technology.

The workshop responds to the needs of policymakers and other stakeholders working on health, intellectual property and trade issues related to the pandemic, and is specifically targeted at them. The aim of these workshops is to strengthen the capacity of policymakers and experts in members of the three organizations to address the pandemic accordingly. The first in the series of workshops was held on 27 September 2021.

The event is part of the existing collaboration framework between the three organizations, as first highlighted by their Directors-General on 15 June 2021. WIPO Director-General Daren Tang, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala agreed that the three agencies will collaborate on the organization of practical capacity-building workshops at the technical level to enhance the flow of updated information on current developments in the pandemic and responses to achieve equitable access to COVID-19 health technologies.

The trilateral collaboration was further reaffirmed at a meeting on 1 February 2022, where the heads of the three organizations committed to working closely together to help overcome the COVID-19 pandemic and its devastating human, social and economic impacts.

Source: wto.org