When the next pandemic hits, it will not spare us
In Geneva this week, the world's nations arrived at the World Health Assembly without the pandemic treaty they had promised themselves in the wake of COVID-19's devastation. Two years of negotiation among 194 WHO member states collapsed under the weight of an ancient tension: the competing claims of sovereignty and solidarity, of intellectual property and shared survival. The failure is not merely procedural — it is a mirror held up to the question of whether humanity, having witnessed catastrophic inequity, possesses the collective will to prevent it from recurring.
- After COVID-19 exposed a brutal gap between nations that hoarded vaccines and those that waited years for doses, world leaders vowed a binding treaty — and then spent two years failing to write one.
- The deadlock is concrete: developing nations demand guaranteed access to the vaccines and treatments they help make possible by sharing virus samples, while wealthy nations guard intellectual property rights and resist ceding authority to the WHO.
- Political pressure from within powerful states deepened the impasse — U.S. Republican senators warned the Biden administration the draft threatened IP protections, and Britain signalled it would only sign on its own terms.
- The WHO's director-general called COVID-19 vaccine inequity 'a catastrophic moral failure,' yet even that indictment could not move negotiations to consensus before the assembly opened.
- Talks will continue at the World Health Assembly, but without a timeline, a finalized draft, or any binding enforcement mechanism, the next pandemic may arrive before an agreement does.
The World Health Assembly convened in Geneva this week under the shadow of a broken promise. After COVID-19 laid bare the vast inequity between nations that secured vaccines swiftly and those that waited years, world leaders had committed in 2021 to something better: a binding WHO-led framework for sharing medical resources, coordinating responses, and ensuring that the next pandemic would not repeat the same moral failures. Two years and 194 member states later, there was nothing to show for it.
The co-chairs of the negotiating process acknowledged the shortfall plainly. Roland Driece, one of two co-chairs, admitted the talks had not reached where anyone had hoped. The WHO had envisioned presenting a finalized draft at the assembly's opening — instead, delegates would spend the week examining what went wrong.
The obstacles were neither abstract nor new. Developing nations sought assurance that sharing pathogen samples would translate into affordable access to the vaccines and treatments those samples helped create. Wealthy nations pushed back on proposals that would have directed 20 percent of pandemic-related production to the WHO and required transparency around deals with private manufacturers. U.S. senators warned the draft endangered intellectual property protections; Britain's government said it would only sign if national interests were safeguarded.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus did not concede defeat. Standing before delegates, he insisted the world still needed a pandemic treaty and that the underlying conditions that made COVID-19 so damaging had not disappeared. Co-chair Precious Matsoso was equally resolute, warning that the next pandemic would spare no one. But resolve, however genuine, is not a mechanism — and without binding enforcement or a clear timeline, the question of whether nations can act together remains as open as it was when the negotiations began.
The World Health Assembly was supposed to deliver something the world had promised itself after COVID-19: a binding agreement on how to handle the next pandemic. Instead, delegates arrived in Geneva this week empty-handed. After more than two years of negotiation, the 194 member countries of the World Health Organization could not agree on a single draft treaty.
The failure was not for lack of urgency or stated intention. When the pandemic ended, world leaders had vowed to do better. In 2021, they tasked the WHO with drafting a framework for how nations might share scarce medical resources, coordinate responses, and prevent future viruses from spreading unchecked across borders. The goal was straightforward: ensure that the next time a pathogen emerged, wealthy and poor countries would not face the same chasm that defined the COVID years—when rich nations hoarded vaccines while developing countries waited months or years for doses.
But on Friday, as the assembly's opening day approached, Roland Driece, one of two co-chairs steering the negotiations, had to acknowledge what had become clear: there would be no agreement to present. "We are not where we hoped we would be when we started this process," he said. The WHO had hoped to unveil a finalized draft at the assembly's opening on Monday. Instead, the organization would spend the week discussing what went wrong and how to move forward.
The sticking points were concrete and deep. Developing nations wanted assurance that if they provided virus samples to help create vaccines and treatments, they would actually be able to afford those products. Wealthy countries worried about intellectual property rights and sovereignty. The latest draft had proposed giving the WHO access to 20 percent of pandemic-related production—tests, treatments, vaccines—and requiring countries to disclose their deals with private manufacturers. That was too much for some. U.S. Republican senators had written to the Biden administration warning that the treaty threatened intellectual property protections and expanded WHO authority. Britain's health department said it would only sign if the accord protected British national interests.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO's director-general, called the vaccine inequity of COVID-19 "a catastrophic moral failure." Yet even with that language on the record, the world could not agree on how to prevent it from happening again. Standing before delegates on the final day of failed negotiations, Tedros insisted the outcome was not a defeat. "We will try everything—believing that anything is possible—and make this happen because the world still needs a pandemic treaty," he said. "Because many of the challenges that caused a serious impact during COVID-19 still exist."
Precious Matsoso, the other co-chair, echoed the resolve. "We will make sure that this happens, because when the next pandemic hits, it will not spare us," she said. The negotiations would continue. But there was no timeline, no binding mechanism to force compliance, and no guarantee that the next attempt would succeed where this one had stalled. The world had learned the hard way what happens when nations act alone. Now it would have to learn whether it could act together.
Citas Notables
We are not where we hoped we would be when we started this process— Roland Driece, co-chair of WHO negotiating board
The vaccine inequity of COVID-19 amounted to a catastrophic moral failure— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why did this take two years and still fall apart? What's actually hard about agreeing to share vaccines?
It's not really about vaccines in the abstract. It's about who controls the technology, who profits, and who gets to decide. If you're a rich country, you want to protect your companies' patents. If you're poor, you want access at cost. Those aren't easily reconciled.
So it's just money and power?
Partly. But there's also genuine disagreement about what fairness means. Developing countries say: we give you our virus samples, we help you understand the pathogen, but then we can't afford the cure. That feels extractive to them. Wealthy nations say: we can't just hand over intellectual property or we kill the incentive to innovate. Both arguments have weight.
The WHO proposed giving itself 20 percent of production. That seems reasonable?
On paper, maybe. But it assumes countries will actually comply, and there's no enforcement mechanism. A country can promise to share and then not. That's the real problem—there's no teeth in any of this.
So what happens now?
They keep talking. But the clock is ticking in a way nobody wants to admit. The next pandemic could start tomorrow. And we'll be just as unprepared as we were in 2020.
Do you think they'll eventually agree?
I think they have to. The alternative is too costly. But "eventually" might be years away, and by then the political will might have faded. That's the real risk.