October 22, 2024
Guest post by Spark Street Advisors
Last week relevant stakeholders were invited to a meeting with the Bureau for an Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) for a pandemic agreement.
The jury is out on whether or not negotiating states come to a consensus by mid-November, which is the deadline for calling a Special Session of the World Health Assembly (WHA) before the end of 2024. If they don’t meet this deadline, negotiations would de facto continue through May 2025, when the WHA is next scheduled to meet.
Beginning on the 4th of November, the INB will begin their 12th session in Geneva, which will be make or break. They continue to discuss the latest version of the draft, last published on Friday 20th September.
In preparation for these meetings, a group of stakeholders, including Resolve to Save Lives, AIDS Health Care Foundation Global Public Health Institute at the University of Miami, AVAC, the Independent Panel Secretariat, and Spark Street Advisors, have prepared an analysis of the current text. We are available to discuss our analysis.
In summary, the current text is very weak, and there is little time left to agree more than 100 paragraphs which still remain TBC. Core issues, including Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing, Financing, and One Health, remain unresolved. And there is no clear path to accountability.
We will keep you updated when the formal negotiations resume. Until then, the INB continues to have informal drafting group meetings, including on Chapter I and specific articles. The openings and closing of the INB12 will be public, with daily briefings with stakeholders. The Bureau has also promised to circulate a revised version of the text prior to the opening.