Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development

Comité permanent des affaires étrangères et du développement international

For immediate release

Ottawa, October 24, 2022 -

Today, the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development presented a report to the House of Commons entitled Overcoming the Barriers to Global Vaccine Equity and Ending the Pandemic.

The Committee’s report underscores the persistent disparity between COVID-19 vaccination coverage in high- and low-income countries – as well as the disparity in access to treatments – and assesses the effectiveness of the Canadian government’s over $3.4 billion of international assistance in response to the pandemic.

As its title suggests, the report also identifies barriers that the Committee believes need to be overcome to both end the COVID-19 pandemic and to put Canada in a better position to contribute to global responses to future pandemics.

To that end, the Committee’s report makes 11 recommendations, several of which relate to intellectual property rights. It recommends, for example, that the Canadian government advocate for an extension of the World Trade Organization’s June 2022 Ministerial Decision on the TRIPS Agreement to cover the production and supply of COVID-19 diagnostics and therapeutics.

It also recommends that the Canadian government immediately add COVID-19 vaccines, diagnostics, and treatments to Schedule 1 of the Patent Act, so that generic versions can be exported to developing countries under the Canada’s Access to Medicines Regime (CAMR).

At the same time, the report calls for immediate improvements in CAMR’s administration and communication, and for a public consultation on the regime.

Other recommendations include a call for increased funding for health systems in low-income countries and for community-based projects that combat vaccine misinformation and hesitancy.

The Committee thanks all the witnesses who contributed to the Committee’s work through testimony and written briefs.

The full text of the Committee’s report is available on its website.

Appended to the report is a dissenting opinion from the Conservative Party and a supplementary opinion from the New Democratic Party of Canada.