Agreement will help to create a more enabling environment to support the journey towards making the 100 Days Mission a reality
Today marks a historic milestone for global pandemic prevention, preparedness and response (PPR). We welcome the formal adoption of the World Health Organization (WHO) Pandemic Agreement at the 78th World Health Assembly.
The Agreement reflects an unprecedented collective commitment to better prepare the world for future pandemics. It builds on lessons learned from COVID-19 and other outbreaks, embedding equity and science at the heart of PPR. The adoption of this Agreement sets a foundation for a safer, fairer, and more resilient future.
The 100 Days Mission (100DM) aims to ensure that safe, effective, and affordable diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines (DTVs) are ready for production at scale within 100 days of a pandemic threat being identified. Key to this is agreeing on the rules guiding a pandemic response well in advance so that no time is wasted during an outbreak. The Agreement adopted today represents an important step towards that goal, recognising that further action is needed to fully realise the ambition of the 100 Days Mission.
Alignment between the Pandemic Agreement and the 100 Days Mission
We commend WHO, the International Negotiating Body (INB) and Member States for embedding several priorities which were highlighted in the original 100DM recommendations and which have the potential to contribute to the 100DM end goals as shown below.
What next? From commitment to action
The adoption of the Pandemic Agreement is not the final destination, it is a starting point. Member States will follow their national processes to decide if and how they will ratify and implement the Agreement, requiring at least 60 countries to ratify before it can become legally binding.
Delivering on the promise of faster, fairer, and more effective pandemic response requires sustained, coordinated action across several fronts:
- Reinvigorating research and development (R&D) pipelines: While the Agreement requires countries to build and sustain geographically diverse and sustainable R&D capacities and capabilities, better coordination and stronger financial commitments are needed to support MCM R&D based on the whole viral family research approaches. The 100 Days Mission Scorecard offers an existing platform to quantify preparedness across pipelines for priority pathogens and provides a clear evidence base to prioritise investment in prototype vaccines, scalable diagnostics and therapeutics. It will take innovative public-private partnerships to fill the R&D gaps. Initiatives like the Therapeutics Development Coalition can help invigorate fragile therapeutic pipelines, ensuring they are fit-for-purpose and deliver affordable innovations, but they need greater global support.
- Ensuring equitable access in practice: Delivering on commitments to equitable access requires respectful partnerships with communities across geographies as well as specific obligations to ensure access is embedded into the R&D process by design. For example, by including provisions in R&D funding agreements, such as commitments on voluntary licensing and technology transfer to enable robust manufacturing partnerships, and affordable pricing strategies.
- Fully articulating the Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) System (Article 12). As negotiations around the detailed terms of the PABS System, including fair benefit-sharing arrangements and financing mechanisms, begin as early as this September, it is crucial that Member State deliberations are informed by scientific and civil society expertise from across the world. Ensuring that the PABS system supports rapid and efficient sharing of samples and data on pathogens with pandemic potential to expedite R&D for medical countermeasures, at all times, as well as equitable access to the outputs of such R&D is crucial.
- Operationalising financing mechanisms: The Coordinating Financial Mechanism should be rapidly operationalised with clear triggers for disbursement.
Furthermore, future implementation efforts supported through the impending Conference of the Parties (COP) should:
- Establish clear targets and milestones for the first five years of Agreement implementation.
- Draw together existing monitoring mechanisms to provide cohesive, streamlined assessments of readiness.
- Ensure close coordination between the WHO Secretariat, WHO Member States, and key stakeholders, including international organisations, the private sector and civil society organisations.
- Mobilise the necessary technical and financial resources.
- Maintain political momentum across health, finance, and development sectors, in the face of ongoing reductions in resources for health.
The International Pandemic Preparedness Secretariat, together with our 100 Days Mission partners, stands ready to support implementation and to work with all stakeholders to deliver on the shared ambition: a world better equipped to prevent, prepare, and respond to future pandemics.
Statement endorsed by the following organisations:
