(gentle music)
-: [Narrator] Health equity
is no longer just a human-rights issue.
Today, it's become a business imperative.
Growing pressure from investors, civil society,
healthcare providers, and patients is inspiring public- and
private-sector organizations to address inequities.
(dramatic music)
-: Drugs are available in high-income countries,
drugs that save lives.
Those same drugs are not available or they're
too expensive in low- and middle-income countries,
and so people are dying
simply because they do not have access.
The Medicines Patent Pool was set up in 2010 by Unitaid.
So, at the time, there were new patented drugs for HIV,
but they were too expensive
for most low- and middle-income countries,
and the concept was
that if we could persuade pharmaceutical companies
to give us licenses on their patented drugs,
we could sublicense it to generic manufacturers
who could produce affordable but high-quality versions.
-: Then this mandate evolved in TB and Hep-C
and other infectious disease spaces.
Once COVID showed up, what happened is
that the world recognized the mechanism
of voluntary licensing through MPP as an excellent way
to have global access to the medicines.
-: So in 2021, this was set up
as the mRNA Technology Transfer Programme,
and the idea was to establish vaccine manufacturing
in a way that was sustainable
to make sure that the companies that receive the technology
will be in a position to respond to the next pandemic.
The interest is in the platform
that can then be used for other diseases.
The key concept behind this is empowerment,
so what MPP are doing is supporting the growth
of this capability in low- and middle-income countries.
This program is different
to anything really that's been tried before.
-: [Narrator] The Medicines Patent Pool and partners
established a Technology Transfer Programme
for mRNA vaccines in South Africa.
-: You have to remember that at the beginning
it was just a concept and it needed a lot of shaping,
and BCG were extremely helpful in doing that.
BCG stepped into the gap
and really provided the project management
and a lot of the legs, if you like,
to really get this off the ground.
-: Once it comes to put a structure
and align stakeholders around the table
and make them speak at one voice,
this is one of the things I think BCG did
that was strongly contributing to the success
of the mRNA program from scratch.
-: [Narrator] The program successfully developed
the first mRNA vaccine candidate, AfriVac 2121.
To date, all but one of the 15 program partners
received the introduction training
for developing the mRNA platform at country level.
-: What COVID has done is really focus people's attention
on the critical nature of health inequalities
and making sure that we address them.
That means that there need to be a lot more licenses given
to us, in our opinion, to ensure health equity.
-: This, of course, increased the visibility
of MPP in the world,
and our mandate would then expand it,
including the NCD space.
-: Licensing too often has been thought of as a PR activity
or a CSR activity,
and so we're delighted to be partnering with BCG
to look at how we can quantify the dollar value
of doing licensing.
If we can do this successfully,
this could completely change the mindset in industry,
and that could revolutionize access.
(dramatic music)