While covid-19 is prompting countries to consider exercising flexibilities in the World Trade Organization’s TRIPS (trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights) agreement for facilitating the supply of affordable and effective medicines to patients, the recently-released Special 301 Report by the United States Trade Representative (USTR) exhibits a neglect of the difficulties that countries are going through.
India continues to be placed on the USTR’s “Priority Watch List". US regulations empower the USTR to pursue a course of action that would elicit a favourable response from countries placed on this list.