On 9th February 2021, Dr Aisling McMahon and Dr Kieran Harkin representing Access to Medicines Ireland (AMI) were invited to address the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence on equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines in low and middle income countries, alongside Ms. Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS, and Dr David Nabarro, the World Health Organization’s Special Envoy on Covid-19.
Dr McMahon’s and Dr Harkin’s opening statement highlighted the need for global equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines and the inequalities around access arising currently. AMI called for global solidarity and action to alleviate vaccine inequity globally, and for governments to support initiatives, like the COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) as a key step to achieving this. Dr McMahon highlighted that the C-TAP initiative has the potential to maximise manufacturing capacity for COVID-19 vaccines, medicines and diagnostics globally, to accelerate the development of new technologies by encouraging the sharing of know-how and data, and to facilitate more affordable access to vaccines, medicines and diagnostics for COVID-19.
A video of this Oireachtas Committee meeting is available here and the press release is available here. It has been reported on in the Irish Times, Business Post and the Irish Examiner.
Dr McMahon is an Assistant Professor of Law in Maynooth University where her research specialises in intellectual property and medical law. She has published widely in these fields, including a recent article in the Journal of Medical Ethics examining the role of patent holders in the context of global equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, medicines and diagnostics.