Professor Matthews was interviewed by Pharma Technology Focus and Aljazeera.
Duncan Matthews, Professor of Intellectual Property Law at Queen Mary University of London, was interviewed in Pharma Technology Focus on proposals for a waiver on intellectual property protection for health related technologies during the Covid-19 pandemic.
He pointed out that, while the prospects for an IP waiver remain uncertain, the pandemic is an opportunity to address the drug access and manufacturing problems that low and middle-income countries face, and better prepare for future public health crises. “I think historically there has been an absence of planning and pandemic preparedness, so there's an endemic lack of production capacity in middle and low-income countries, which is exacerbating the current problem. The attention is now focusing not only on the current pandemic response, but also what lessons we can learn to improve pandemic preparedness and pharmaceutical innovation in response to future global healthcare crises,” he said. “By transferring technology and scaling up production in middle and low-income countries now, this will be part of the strategy of being prepared for the next pandemic, so we're not in the same position again.” Read the full story on Pharma Technology Focus.
Professor Matthews was also featured on Aljazeera discussing patent waivers for Covid-19 vaccines.