A. Issues in the Environment
1. Coronavirus Disease vaccine roll-out
1.1 Cabinet welcomed the progress with COVID-19 vaccinations which had on Tuesday, 8 June 2021 reached 1, 524, 589 and the Pfizer. | June 10, 2021
Light in the gloom
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The already fragile national mood has turned decidedly more sour over the past few weeks as the country descended, yet again, into confidence-sapping load-shedding, tightened lockdown rules in response to the third Covid-19 wave and confirmed its worst-ever official unemployment figure of 32.6%. Adding to the despair are ongoing stories of nauseating corruption, which, like water torture, is now so mentally painful that it is driving even the most well-meaning of South Africans to thoughts of a tax revolt, or worse.
India and South Africa’s proposal for a temporary waiver on some sections of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement has achieved ‘tremendous mileage and progression’ at the World Trade Organization (WTO), with member countries agreeing on starting text-based negotiations, commerce secretary Anup Wadhawan said on Thursday.
“That is a positive development.Now the parties at the WTO have agreed to do text based negotiations. That s a way forward, which means that countries broadly in principle have accepted the objective behind the waiver proposal. To give effect to the objective, they will have text-based negotiations,” Wadhawan told reporters.
Civil society organisations are calling on the government to join the growing number of countries supporting a patent waiver on the COVID-19 vaccine, reports Jim McIlroy.