GENEVA: Spain’s top research institution reached a licensing deal that paves the way for its Covid-19 antibody test to be produced more cheaply in developing countries.
The World Health Organization described the accord as the first transparent, global, non-exclusive licence for a Covid-19 health tool that will help correct “devastating global inequity”.
The deal brings together the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), the global Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) and the WHO’s Covid-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) knowledge-sharing platform.
“The aim of the licence is to facilitate the rapid manufacture and commercialisation of CSIC’s Covid-19 serological test worldwide,” the WHO said.
The test effectively detects anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies developed in response to either a Covid-19 infection or a vaccine.
CSIC, one of Europe’s main public research institutions, will provide the MPP or prospective licensees with know-how and training.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the licence, which will be royalty-free for low- and middle-income countries, as “the kind of open and transparent licence we need to move the needle on access during and after the pandemic.”
He added: “I urge developers of Covid-19 vaccines, treatments and diagnostics to follow this example and turn the tide… on the devastating global inequity this pandemic has spotlighted.”
C-TAP was founded in May 2020 as a platform for developers of Covid-19 treatments, tests and vaccines and other health products to share intellectual property, knowledge and data.
