Negotiating a successful pandemic treaty should address a four-fold purpose: to prevent, prepare for, respond to and recover from pandemics effectively (Phelan and Carlson, 2022, Science, 377, 475). Since the proposal for an international treaty on pandemic prevention and preparedness was endorsed by 26 heads of state and the WHO Director-General in March 2021, WHO member states assigned an Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) with the responsibility of coordinating negotiations in anticipation of adopting an agreement by May 2024. To date, four INB meetings have been held. In this analysis, the interventions of 43 member states at the INB sessions in July 2022 were evaluated against components considered integral to an effective pandemic treaty. These were mapped against elements previously identified for a transformative treaty (Phelan and Carlson, 2022). This analysis outlines gaps in the current pandemic treaty working draft and the INB negotiations, which may identify opportunities to enhance the value of the remaining negotiations and guide refinement in developing further iterations of the working draft.
Photo by Oussama Bergaoui