LEADING HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENT GROUPS CALL FOR GLOBAL ACTION TO PREVENT PANDEMICS ILLEGAL LOGGING ON PIRITITI INDIGENOUS LANDS, RORAIMA STATE, BRAZIL COVID-19 MASS GRAVES, NEW YORK CITY, USA The Coalition to Prevent Pandemics at the Source calls on United States Congress to Prioritize Pandemic Prevention​ ​ ​ February 10, 2021 ​ Hon. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker, United States House of Representatives Hon. Kevin McCarthy, Minority Leader, United States House of Representatives Hon. Chuck Schumer, Majority Leader, United States Senate Hon. Mitch McConnell, Minority Leader, United States Senate ​ Dear Madam Speaker, Mr. Minority Leader, Mr. Majority Leader, Mr. Minority Leader, Zoonotic spillover – the transmission of novel pathogens, from animals to humans – is the origin of most emerging infectious diseases, including COVID-19. The rate of zoonotic disease outbreaks is rapidly increasing, driven by human activities that increase interactions between wildlife, livestock, and people. Land use change, particularly the clearing, degradation, and fragmentation of tropical forests within emerging disease hotspots, as well as wildlife trade, and intensive livestock production are of greatest concern. With six times more outbreaks in 2010 than 1980, the next million-death pandemic is more likely to happen in the next decade than in the next century and will almost certainly be the result of another zoonotic spillover. We applaud the measures outlined in President Biden’s National Security Directive 1 for new bilateral and multilateral efforts to strengthen the international COVID-19 response. We note, however, that these measures are largely directed at pandemic response and containment (surveillance and preparedness measures to stop an outbreak from spreading). ​ We thank the Congress for restoring modest amounts of U.S. bilateral and multilateral assistance in tropical countries for zoonotic spillover surveillance, the management of sustainable landscapes, conserving the ecological integrity of intact forests, and enforcing wildlife trade policies in the FY21 Consolidated Appropriations Act. ​ The need remains for far more leadership and investment regarding pandemic prevention. We can stop future pandemics at the source by reducing spillover of pathogens from animals to humans. If COVID-19 has made one thing clear, it is that the cost of even the boldest initiative to prevent future pandemics is orders of magnitude less than the price we pay once a pandemic occurs. ​ Our coalition of leading U.S.-based, global public health and environmental organizations recommends scaling up international efforts to prevent zoonotic spillover through increased funding to mainstream One Health. Such programs strengthen local human and animal health systems and implement risk reduction activities at points of human-animal contact. They include reducing forest clearing and degradation, preventing commercial wildlife trade that risks contributing to zoonotic spillover, strictly monitoring and reducing disease risk from wildlife markets, improving biosecurity on farms in emerging disease hotspots, and ensuring the health systems of poor countries and local communities are equipped to stop outbreaks. ​ As Congress and the Biden Administration draft the emergency COVID-19 package, we ask that you ensure a significant level of new funds is directed to support programs and activities that prevent pandemics at the source through development assistance programs focused on One Health, forest conservation, and wildlife trade, including to help support frontline and Indigenous communities in zoonotic spillover hotspots. ​ We are also calling on the Administration to lead an effort to create a Global Fund for Pandemic Prevention, with an initial $2.5 billion commitment as leverage to recruit other major donors to this effort. Such a Fund could be announced as part of the action agenda at the Group of Seven hosted this year by the UK and would galvanize greater international action on pandemic prevention while also ensuring other nations share the cost. ​ These investments will also help expand successful approaches providing healthcare and job training that have achieved impressive impacts for frontline communities. These impacts include a more than 90 percent reduction in the number of families engaged in unsustainable logging, health benefits (including a two thirds reduction in infant mortality) and preventing carbon emissions worth more than 10 times the cost of the program through reduced deforestation. Expanding these local and community-based solutions will reduce the risks of zoonotic spillover and help stop the next pandemic before it starts. ​ The United States and other countries should also use their diplomatic, trade and purchasing power to influence countries and companies to reduce deforestation and forest degradation, adopt wildlife policies favorable to pandemic prevention, and ensure that impoverished countries have access to the assistance they need to conserve and protect natural resources, provide healthcare and livelihood alternatives for local communities, and secure planetary health. 'Building back better' also means enhancing global health security, which must include U.S. leadership and investments to prevent pandemics at the source. Our coalition stands ready to assist in these efforts and urges Congress to ensure that significant new international funding is available as part of the federal response to COVID-19. ​ Respectfully, ​ Coalition to Prevent Pandemics at the Source (in alphabetical order): Conservation International Dalberg Catalyst EcoHealth Alliance Health In Harmony The Nature Conservancy (TNC) R2H Action [Right to Health] Rainforest Alliance Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) World Resources Institute (WRI) World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Other endorsers: Advisors to the Coalition: Dr. Aaron Bernstein, Interim Director, Harvard Chan C-CHANGE; Pediatric Hospitalist, Boston Children’s Hospital Melinda Kimble, Professor, Syracuse University Dr. Thomas Lovejoy, Professor, George Mason University ​ Also signed by: Animal Defenders International If Not Us Then Who? International Foundation for Animal Welfare Marked by COVID, leading U.S. grassroots organization of families who lost loved ones to COVID-19 Mighty Earth ​ ​ Copied to: Chairwoman Rosa DeLauro, House Committee on Appropriations Ranking Member Kay Granger, House Committee on Appropriations Chairman Patrick Leahy, Senate Committee on Appropriations Ranking Member Richard Shelby, Senate Committee on Appropriations Chairwoman Barbara Lee, House Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations Ranking Member Hal Rogers, House Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations Ranking Member Lindsay Graham, Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations Chairman Gregory Meeks, House Committee on Foreign Affairs Ranking Member Michael McCaul, House Committee on Foreign Affairs Chairman Robert Menendez, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations Ranking Member James E. Risch, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations ​ DOWNLOAD LETTER

DEMAND CONGRESS PASS EMERGENCY COVID FUNDS NOW

Scientists, Academics and Experts Call on Joe Biden for global vaccine manufacturing If you are a health professional or student, academic, scientist or public health worker, please join this expert letter to the Biden Administration calling for a global plan to vaccinate everyone, everywhere. ​ ​ COVID-19 has illuminated the inequalities that bring accelerating waves of pandemics that disproportionately impact those who were already made poor and sick. With billions waiting in line for vaccines the public paid to invent, and variants spreading unchecked, the world can't wait. The IMF has published that $50 billion to vaccinate the world will create $9 TRILLION in savings by 2025 — a 267% return on investment almost immediately . Please join this experts open letter u rging the Biden Administration to ensure there are enough vaccines to solve this global crisis. ​ Full text of the letter is here , below the endorsement form. Experts Letter Text FULL TEXT: EXPERTS CALL ON PRESIDENT BIDEN FOR A GLOBAL COVID-19 VACCINE PLAN

Overdue: Global Fund Against Pandemics Disease outbreaks are accelerating and intensifying, sped up by climate change, deforestation and wildlife trade. ​ It doesn't have to be this way. Learn about the plan in the infographic below. Then join the movement to win. ​ ADDITIONAL RESOURCES: World Bank Ratifies HISTORIC Pandemic Fund, but our global health breakthrough is threatened by exclusions of poor countries and spillover prevention. Read our statement here. Read R2HA's recommendations responding to problematic World Bank white paper on financial intermediary fund (FIF) for Pandemics R2H submits input to the World Health Organization's Health Emergency Preparedness and Response (HEPR) Paper at the 2022 World Health Assembly. Read our statement here LEAKED World Bank Board Memo leaves out countries and communities—and fails to stop pandemics . INFOGRAPHIC below is based on a memo co-written by Right to Health Action and Health in Harmony. Download the memo here. Graph by Vora et al, 2022. Available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-01312-y Deadly diseases are accelerating rapidly and become more deadly ​ Economists conservatively predict that COVID-19 will cost the global economy at least $16 trillion Containment-alone , without action to prevent outbreaks, is ineffective, costly, colonialist, and dangerous to global communities ​ ​ Stop outbreaks before they happen ​ ​ The Pandemic Fund must be accessible and accountable to low-income countries, stigmatized populations, and front-line communities Borneo Model of listening to communities brings results: 67% decrease in infant mortality >90% reduction in logging households—corresponding with a steep reduction in outbreak risk. significant declines in malaria, tuberculosis, neglected tropical diseases, chronic obsuctructive pulmonary disease, and diabetes poverty alleviation 21,000 hectares of forest regrowth $65.3 million in averted carbon loss Break Deadly Silos: Development and conservation work has been for too-long isolated in health, security, agriculture, education, or microfinance silos. ​ Global health and climate advocates rarely sit at same table. It's time for donor governments to fund an intersectoral, systems-based approach. Pandemics are coming faster—and getting worse. There were 6 times more zoonotic spillovers of disease from animals to humans in 2010 than in 1980. [1,2] Scientists report a direct link between zoonotic diseases and tropical deforestation. [3] We already know what to do to definitively stop the pandemics of the future. ​ A G20 High Level Independent Panel reported “The current pandemic was not a black swan event. Indeed, it may ultimately be seen as a dress rehearsal. … There is every likelihood the next pandemic is coming within a decade or even in the next year, and could be even more profoundly damaging to human health and the global economy than COVID .” [4] Policymakers must anticipate, and plan for a pandemic sooner, rather than later, that is as contagious as COVID and as deadly as Ebola . [5] Inaction is more expensive than prevention The costs of COVID to the U.S. economy alone is estimated at $16 trillion. [6] Experts from McKinsey to Harvard's Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment agree comparatively modest global investments of as little as $20 billion annually will avert $31-$50 trillion in economic losses—and save millions of lives. [7][8] By all counts, insufficient action is overwhelmingly more expensive than even the boldest pandemic prevention plan. We need both containment and prevention More than two years after COVID-19 exploded worldwide, policymaker discussions of “pandemic preparedness” are still overwhelmingly focused exclusively on containment — that is, detecting future outbreaks sooner, and responding faster to stop the spread of diseases. Containment is urgently important, as is every possible measure to support developing countries to fully implement an expanded version of WHO's International Health Regulations (IHRs) agenda. But, as COVID-19 has demonstrated repeatedly, even the most prepared, best resourced national containment plans are defeated in the face of increasingly aggressive viral antagonists — even more when factoring in vaccine hesitancy. ​ What is missing is action to stop outbreaks from happening in the first place. Global leaders seeking to stop pandemics must incorporate an additional, high-priority focus on tackling the environmental drivers of zoonotic spillover. Without true prevention measures, the globe is merely paying to send outmatched firetrucks to a raging conflagration. We propose instead models that stop the fire from ever igniting. A pandemic prevention model: Set measurable goals for containment --traditional global health security. Put funds on the table to meet the IHRs in all low- and middle-income countries in five years . But don't stop there. Direct funding towards the proven spillover prevention models that reduce deforestation by 80-90% and higher, steeply reducing risk of outbreaks. Bring these models to scale, and replicate across all high-risk zoonotic spillover communities. Spillover prevention includes significant knock-on benefits for human and animal health, human rights, and climate, biodiversity and wildlife conservation. Support large-scale, pathogen-agnostic global surveillance systems Always-warm system ready to produce vaccines worldwide in 100 days (not three years) and share the products of public research. Train and retain professional and community health workers needed to support the health systems we need to stop pandemics and realize the right to health. What a Global Pandemic Fund should fund: Pandemic Containment and Prevention Plans in low- and middle-income zoonotic spillover hotspot countries.[9] Set a deadline to meet World Health Organization IHRs and Global Health Security Agenda targets to contain outbreaks, building health systems, and moving towards the human right to health. Support community health, jobs training, and policy changes to halt deforestation and unsafe wildlife trade. U.S. contributions to a Global Pandemic Fund should be matched by other donors 2:1 Repeat success by copying the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria’s lean structures of Secretariat / North-South-CSO Board / Country Coordinating Mechanisms (see below). Case Study Indonesia: Cost-Effective Pandemic Prevention In 2007, a program in Indonesia asked Indigenous communities in the Borneo Rainforest, “What do you need to stop logging?” The community deliberated and finally responded that, in a deforestation-based local economy, they would need alternative livelihood training—new jobs. They also responded that the highest local costs to individuals was health care. In response, Health in Harmony, the NGO leading the work, invested $5.2 million over 10 years in an Indonesian medical center, as well as a locally operated jobs training program. The organization is now replicating this model, protecting nine million hectares of tropical forest at sites in Indonesia, Madagascar, and the Amazon — an area larger than the UK. Researchers from Stanford University analysed 10 years of data from the most mature site in Borneo, and published their findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. [10] How a Global Pandemic Prevention Fund should operate: To facilitate locally-designed, country-owned health systems and solutions that are effective and sustainable, a new pandemic prevention initiative can borrow pages from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM): Donors contribute to a pool. Poor countries apply, jointly with civil society, faith-based organizations (FBOs) and the private sector. The initiative’s board should include an equal number of donor and implementing countries, and include protected seats for civil society, Indigenous people, and communities disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 and future pandemics. Replicate GFATM’s “Country Coordinating Mechanism” to convene civil society, public institutions, and communities to create national and community-level Pandemic Prevention Plans and submit for funding. At the national- and community-level in zoonotic spillover hotspot countries, convene public sector health officials, civil society, faith-based organizations and public health institutions to devise costed country- and community- owned plans to to stop spillover events, and meet IHRs priority actions identified in joint external evaluation (JEE) reports. Use online listening and training programs in conjunction with WHO to convene in-country teams to meet with Indigenous and local rainforest communities to learn about the drivers of - and determine solutions to - forest degradation. Fund Memos This infographic was adapted from a memo co-written by Right to Health Action and Health in Harmony. Download the memo here References [1] Smith, K., Goldberg, M., Rosenthal, S., Carlson, L., Chen, J., Chen, C., Ramachandran, S. (2014). Global rise in human infectious disease outbreaks. J R Soc Interface, 11(101). Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4223919/ [2] McKay, B., Dvorak, P. (2020). A Deadly Coronavirus Was Inevitable. Why Was No One Ready? | The Wall Street Journal. [online] Available at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-deadly-coronavirus-was-inevitable-why-was-no-one-ready-for-covid-11597325213 [3] Bloomfield, L.S.P., McIntosh, T.L. & Lambin, E.F. Habitat fragmentation, livelihood behaviors, and contact between people and nonhuman primates in Africa. Landscape Ecol 35, 985–1000 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-020-00995-w [4] G20 High Level Independent Panel Report on on Financing Pandemic Preparedness and Response, A Global Deal for Our Pandemic Age. [online] Available at https://www.g20.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/G20-HLIP-Report.pdf [5] Kiley, S., Formanek I., Kottasová, I. The Coming Contagion: Hunting for 'Disease X' CNN [online.] https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/22/africa/drc-forest-new-virus-intl/index.html [6] Powell, A. (2020, November 10). What might COVID cost the U.S.? Experts eye $16 trillion. Harvard Gazette. [online] Available at https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/11/what-might-covid-cost-the-u-s-experts-eye-16-trillion/ [7] McKinsey & Company. Not the last pandemic: Investing now to reimagine public-health systems. Accessed online: 30 Nov 2020: www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/not-the-last-pandemic-investing-now-to-reimagine-public-health-systems ​ [8] “Ecology and Economics for Pandemic Prevention,” Andrew P. Dobson, Stuart Pimm, Lee Hannah, Les Kaufman, Jorge A. Ahumada, Amy W. Ando, Aaron Bernstein, Jonah Busch, Peter Daszak, Jens Engelmann, Margaret Kinnaird, Binbin Li, Ted Loch-Temzelides, Thomas Lovejoy, Katarzyna Nowak, Patrick Roehrdanz,and Mariana M. Vale; Science, July 24, 2020. Accessed online at https://science.sciencemag.org/content/369/6502/379 ​ [9] Allen, T., Murray, K.A., Zambrana-Torrelio, C. et al. Global hotspots and correlates of emerging zoonotic diseases. Nat Commun 8, 1124 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-00923-8 [online] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-00923-8 ​ [10] Jones, I. J., & et. al. (2020, November 10). Improving rural health care reduces illegal logging and conserves carbon in a tropical forest. PNAS. https://www.pnas.org/content/117/45/28515 ​ [11] Deforestation has slowed down but still remains a concern, new UN. (2020, July 24). UN News. https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/07/1068761#:%7E:text=The%20annual%20rate%20of%20deforestation,12%20million%20during%202010%2D2015. ​ [12] Kinari, Webb. Reentering the Paris Climate Agreement is a must, but no panacea. The Hill, Dec 2020. [Online] https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/530967-reentering-the-paris-climate-agreement-is-a-must-for-the-us-but ​ [13] Jones, I. J., & et. al. (2020, November 10). Improving rural health care reduces illegal logging and conserves carbon in a tropical forest. PNAS. https://www.pnas.org/content/117/45/28515 ​

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More pandemics are coming—soon. Some will be more infectious. Some will be more deadly. Some will be both. As a result of globalization and climate change, new outbreaks are almost exponentially accelerating. With six times more animal-to-human outbreaks in 2010 than 1980, we stand to repeat this deadly cycle within the decade. ​ The time is short to apply the lessons of COVID-19 and enact the policies needed to prevent this nightmare from happening again.​ America needs the People's Pandemic Prevention Plan . 1. PUBLIC HEALTH AND CLIMATE JOBS CORP FIGHTING RACIAL HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL DISPARITIES Restore decades of disinvestment in public health and environmental well-being impoverished communities by creating hundreds of thousands of permanent union jobs in community-based social change organizations, preferentially hiring from vulnerable communities impacted by systemic racism and the policies that push pandemic diseases onto the already poor and sick. ​ Public Health Corps should tackle a broader range of health disparities, such as opioid addiction, homelessness, environmental racism, natural resources restoration and conservation, clean energy, and even rural broadband. The Association of State and Territorial Health Officials estimate that at least 300,000 public health jobs are needed, and this number is supported by Obama/Biden CDC Director Tom Frieden’s estimate. They should be paid a living wage (similar to Census Workers) and belong to a union. Rather than being low-level health service providers for government agencies, the Public Health Corps should be organizers, working at community-based advocacy organizations. These jobs should be purpose-built to organize for social change and mobilize to correct systemic and structural problems that have contributed to communities of color being disproportionately poor and sick long before COVID. We must take additional action to repair and heal the country with new protections for essential workers, COVID survivors, and families, including: (1) compensation for victims and survivors of COVID-19, modeled after the 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund covering out-of-pocket medical costs, mental health counseling, funerals/burials, pain and suffering, and loss of earnings, while also providing GI-bill style educational benefits; (2) Implement an NIH research agenda for the "25-35% or more " of COVID-19 patients Dr. Anthony Fauci reports having long-term symptoms; (3) There are millions of Americans who are or will be temporarily or permanently disabled by coronavirus. These people need hassle-free disability benefits and other social supports; (4) Pass the Essential ​Workers Bill of Rights. R2H Action supports passage of S. 32/H.R. 460 : the Health Force, Resilience Force, and Jobs To Fight COVID–19 Act of 2021 Read More 3. A GLOBAL FUND TO PANDEMIC-PROOF THE PLANET FUNDING BOTTOM-UP, COUNTRY-OWNED, COMMUNITY-LED PANDEMIC PREVENTION PLANS R2H Action supports President Biden's call for a multilateral catalytic financing mechanism, and joins scores of coalition partners and 120 House Members to urge the President and Congress to leverage other donors by putting at least $2 billion on the table in 2021 as seed funding for multilateral action to prevent pandemics at the source. Account after expert account demonstrate that as little as $20 billion annually, from all donor sources, would avert $20-$30 TRILLION in economic losses to a future pandemic—as well as save millions of lives. ​ The United States should use this new global fund to: Fund country-owned, community-driven "National Pandemic Prevention Plans" in every low-income country and every middle-income country that is a zoonotic transmission hotspot. These plans should accomplish at least complementary, interlinked goals: post-spillover pandemic containment , and pre-spillover pandemic prevention . ​ Fully implement WHO’s International Health Regulations and updated Global Health Security Agenda priority actions within five years. Make direct investments in public-sector health systems, including labs, surveillance networks, equipment, supplies, and health workforce to detect, manage, and mitigate outbreaks where they start, before they spread. Finance regional, national, Indigenous and community-led action plans to prevent disease spillovers from animals to humans, focused on the primary upstream drivers of zoonotic transmission: deforestation, climate change, and wildlife trade. Prevent outbreaks at the source by funding community-based economic alternatives to climate change and deforestation in the top 500 zoonotic transmission hotspots, providing health care, jobs training and support for economic development activities less dangerous than palm oil plantations, strip mining, burning the Amazon, illegal logging, and wildlife trade. Supporting country incentives for conservation and reductions in forest degradation, protection of wildlife, and regulation of commercial live-animal markets, husbandry and trade.​​ Increase funds for other global health programs already addressing COVID and other critical pandemics on the ground, and meet Joe Biden’s commitment to “ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic by 2025”, with increases for PEPFAR’s annual budget (flat-funded for years), and sustaining the U.S. contribution to the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria to make up for ground lost due to COVID-19. Read More 2. END VACCINE APARTHEID AFFORDABLE AND ACCESSIBLE MEDICINES AND VACCINES WORLDWIDE—including the USA Drug companies want to keep medicines and vaccines developed with taxpayer-funded R&D ($30 billion so far for COVID-19) under lock and key, hidden behind costly patent monopoly barriers. Pharmaceutical corporation patents on the public's research prop up high prices that leave billions behind, create multi-year manufacturing bottlenecks, and grant privileged access to whiter, wealthier nations. This must change—for all medicines and vaccines, not just those invented during this pandemic. Domestically, exorbitant drug prices are an enormous problem that must be addressed beyond this current crisis. ​ If a prescription drug corporation refuses to license a product or support transfer of technology and know-how internationally, or if the company refuses to agree to a fair price domestically, President Biden should make use of his existing powers to, at the stroke of a pen, license a generic producer. This is the only tactic to ensure prices always come down and that patients always get the medicines they need. The Biden Administration should also include global access and domestic fair pricing clauses in new taxpayer-funded R&D grants. Now that the United States has rejoined the WHO and made a contribution to COVAX, it's time to scale up support for manufacturing, technology, and know-how transfer. Until we help finance vaccine manufacturing hubs and distribution systems strong enough to reach billions more people, COVID-19 will continue to mutate and spread, possibly outrunning the vaccines we have at hand. Smart investments are urgently needed and will last long after the current crisis, once we've built up the industrial capacity already existing in numerous countries across Africa, Asia, and South America. Read More 4. PROHIBIT SALES BY CORPORATIONS THAT PUT THE WORLD'S HEALTH AT RISK Phase-in prohibitions against U.S. product sales by corporations with irresponsible deforestation or illegal/unsafe wildlife trade anywhere in their supply chains. HIV, SARS, H1N1, Ebola, Zika, MERS, and COVID-19 are all zoonotic diseases. Diseases are jumping from animals to humans at a steeply accelerating rate, primarily due to extractive industries that destroy tropical forests and Indigenous communities—in order to sell products to wealthier people elsewhere. Zoonotic disease hotspots have already been mapped out, and climate change-inducing corporate encroachment into wildlife habitats is putting the world at risk . We know where the problems are and what's causing them. All that is missing is action. ​ Support similar initiatives in the EU, UK, and at the G20 level. Prohibit U.S. Government purchases of products with unsafe forest or wildlife supply chains as soon as possible. Support U.S. and international enforcement of regulations for trade in forest and wildlife products, lending support to communities and national authorities, stepped up safety and sanitation for markets, and support for One Health and Planetary Health initiatives. Read More R2H Action, joined by more than 125,000 thousand activist leaders, health workers, scientists, and families impacted by COVID, is fighting for a People’s Pandemic Prevention Plan. This call to action is backed by 1,500 front-line health workers, 450+ organizations (including NAACP, SEIU, Greenpeace USA, Religious Action Center, Families USA, #VOTEPROCHOICE, People’s Action, ACT UP, Friends of the Earth Action, People for the American Way, Global Exchange, Center for Popular Democracy, Public Citizen, Social Security Works, Mighty Earth, Indivisible, Rainforest Alliance and many more ) . Renowned experts like Professor Jeff Sachs, Professor Ruha Benjamin, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, Dr. Nahid Bhadelia and Dr. Paul Farmer have joined the call, and are speaking up in town halls, online forums, and op-eds advocating for this plan. In Autumn 2020, R2H Action joined with Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Ro Khanna to advance the Pandemic Prevention Plan in Congress as a Congressional sign-on letter. After more than 300 grassroots meetings with Members of Congress and tens of thousands of emails and phone calls, 141 Members of Congress endorsed the plan Since then, we've helped draft a dozen bills, joined eight coalitions, enlisted another 120 MOCs on a new letter to President Biden, and are well on our way towards turning this plan into law in 2021. ​ These four priority areas are not all that is needed—but we will not succeed unless we tackle these issues. Organizational Endorsers ORGANIZATIONS ENDORSING THE PEOPLE'S PANDEMIC PREVENTION PLAN : As of 11 October 2020 : NAACP • SEIU • Greenpeace USA • United We Dream • Families USA • Religious Action Center • ACT UP • NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice • Indivisible USA • R2H Action [Right to Health] • Friends of the Earth Action • Center for Popular Democracy • Women’s March Action • Marked by COVID • Public Citizen • Union for Reform Judaism (RAC, Religious Action Center) • Rainforest Alliance • Community Catalyst • CAEAR Coalition • Oxfam • Our Revolution • Natural Resources Defense Council • The AIDS Institute • Human Impact Partners • Mighty Earth • NASTAD (National Association of State and Territorial AIDS Directors) • National Employment Law Project • #VOTEPROCHOICE • Positive Women’s Network USA • Association of Nurses in AIDS Care • AVAC - Global Advocacy for HIV Prevention • Partners In Health • People for the American Way • People's Action • Students for a National Health Program • Global Exchange • Torah Trumps Hate • Dogwood Alliance • Physicians for a National Health Program • Treatment Action Group • Social Security Works • Universal Health Care Action Network • Common Defense • National Women’s Health Network • Coalition on Human Needs • Southern AIDS Coalition • AIDS Alliance for Women, Infants, Children, Youth & Families • Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice • National Coalition of STD Directors • African Services Committee • National Partnership for Women & Families • Grey Panthers • Drug Prices are Too High • Clinicians for Progressive Care • End AIDS Now • Community Health Acceleration Partnership • CODEPINK • ADAP Advocacy Association • Center for Biological Diversity • Housing Works Inc. • Iowa CCI (Citizens for Community Improvement) • Physicians Action Network • Progressive Doctors • Community Access National Network (CANN) • Progressive Reform Network • Latino Commission on AIDS • Organizing for Action USA • The Juggernaut Project • Thermo Fisher Scientific • Witness at the Border • Mainers for Accountable Leadership • National Equal Rights Amendment Alliance • Justice is Global • Antibalas! • Southpaw Michigan • San Francisco AIDS Foundation • Casa de Esperanza: National Latin@ Network for Healthy Families and Communities • American Muslim Health Professionals • The Center for HIV Law and Policy • AIDS Foundation Chicago • Fenway Health Right Care Alliance - MA • Tennessee Anti-Racist Network • Berks Stands Up • 3rd World Matrix • A Space for Healing • A. Philip Randolph Square Neighborhood Alliance • ACT UP Philadelphia • Action Together Bay Area • Action Together Florida • Courage California • Action Together Suncoast • Action Together Walpole • Affordable Homeownership Foundation Inc • Akron Local DSA Akron • Alameda County Health Consortium • Alexander Tenants Association Inc. • Always Looking Up • Amazon Productions • American Security Educators, Inc. • American Voices Abroad Berlin • Amnesty International. Group 213 • Arc Health PBC • Arkansas WAND • Asian Americans for Community Involvement • Banned Books, LLC • Without Walls / Baun Associates • Benedictine Sisters of Baltimore • Benedictine Sisters, Clyde, MO • Berryville Organics • Big Picture Productions • BioMediCon, Inc. • Bolder Benefits, Inc. • Bristlecone Alliance • Broadway Community • Build A Movement 2020 • Butler County Democratic Executive Committee • Calling for Change • Cancer Prevention Daily • Carolina Jews for Justice • Casa de Salud • CDI / Choices for Children • Center for Indian Law • Center For Inquiry • Central Valley Journey 4 Justice • Centre for Environment Human Rights & Development Forum- CEHRDF • Physicians for Social Responsibility - Chicago • Christian Council of Delmarva • Christus Trinity Clinic • Circle of Hope • 7 Toes Productions • Cleveland Power of Wind Action Team • Climate Health Now, California • CO Foundation for Universal Health Care - Candidate Liaison Project for IMFA • Coai, Inc. • Collier Congressional Watchdogs • Colorado Foundation for Universal Health Care • Communities of Shalom, Inc. • Communities Without Borders • Community Food and Justice Coalition • Community Health Partnership • Community of St. Francis, San Francisco • Compassionate Toledo • Congregation of St. Joseph • Ka Ipu Ha'a Mentoring Program • Daughters of Charity • Dearborn Art Group • Deep Water Care • Desert Progressives • Dialogue Institute • District 6 Community Planners • Diversity Directions • DSA Health Workers Collective • Earth Evolution • Ecological Rights Foundation • Economic Inequity Health Task Force of Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility • ECOregon: The Environmental Concert of Oregon • Educultural Foundation • El Sol Neighborhood Educational Center • EMPOWER India • Empowered Connections • Indivisible Englewood • Eno River Unitarian Universalist Earth Justice Team • Environment and Climate Change Canada • Eons Learning • Extinction Rebellion - UW Chapter (XRUW) • Family Council • Farwell Foundation • First Congregational Church - Littleton United Church of Christ NH • Food for the Cure • Fortunate Farm LLC • Foundation for Integrative AIDS Research (FIAR) • Free the Caged Children • Fresh Anointing Ministries • Friends of Earth-San Antonio Chapter • Fund Our Future International • FVM Global Magazine • GaiaYana • Garvin County Environmental Group • Gender Action • Georgetown Medical AIDS Advocacy Network (GMAAN) • Global Green Publication and Productions • Global United Voices Network • GlobeMed at Northwestern, Evanston, IL, US • Gloucester Coalition for the Prevention of Domestic Abuse • Good Neighbor Food Pantry of Woodstock NY • Grandmother's Healing Wisdom • Green Earth Goods • Green Party of the Mid-Columbia, WA • H-Peace • Hadassah, Orlando Chapter • Harvard Asian Pacific American Medical Student Association • Hawaii Institute for Human Rights • Health Care For All MA • Health Care New Zealand • Healthcare for All California/PNHP • Heart's Path Healing • Hershey's Mill Nature Group • Hip Kids Pediatrics • Hoboken RESIST • House of Grace • HTLV/XMRV National Registry • Human Ecology Center • id22: Institute for Creative Sustainability • Idaho Veterans Indivisible • iHealth • Immigrant Service Providers Group, Somerville CDC • IMPACT (Illinois Medical Professionals Action Collaborative Team) • Indian Health Clinics • Indigenous Circle of Flagstaff • Indivisible - 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Test. Protect. • Centre for Health and Development Initiative Africa • National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd • Action Together Stark • DEMSW • Alliance for Development and Population Services • Indivisible St Johns Florida • Global Justice Institute • Good Health Community Programmes • Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights (COLOR) • The Womxn Project • SisterSong: National Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective • National Working Positive Coalition • Broward for Progress • Human Rights Awareness and Promotion Forum • Human Rights Research Documentation Center (HURIC) • LightHouse of Grace • Gaia: The Earth Force United Coalition • Poligon Education Fund • UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose • Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, U.S. Provinces • Massachusetts ME/CFS & FM Association • Unitarian Universalist Justice Florida • Cascade AIDS Project • GLMA: Health Professionals Advancing LGBTQ Equality

Right to Health Rundown - July 2021 This is the very first issue of the R2H Rundown, a newsletter where you’ll hear all about what we’ve been up to and what’s yet to come. The past year has been action packed: we’ve been lobbying, fundraising, and hosting some amazing events. We can’t wait to share exciting updates with you! -Akshita, Ali, & Caroline R2H Team Co-Coordinators Join our Team! Right to Health Action is recruiting for State Captains. If you are interested in organizing at the intersections public health and climate justice, and have a desire to raise a little hell in Congress, then we want you on our team! State Captains play the vital role of organizing a team of in-state constituents to meet with their representatives, spearheading direct actions and training events, and cultivating key local partnerships. They are the powerhouse of our grassroots base! Learn more about the role and submit your application on our website! APPLY TODAY Policy Priorities Since we began, Right to Health Action has hosted over 1,000 lobby meetings with Congressional offices, calling for investments in pandemic preparedness and advocating for a global pandemic prevention fund. We focus on disease outbreak containment and pandemic prevention by addressing deforestation, zoonotic spillover detection, and more! Our current priorities & accomplishments: We recruited 120 members of Congress on a bipartisan letter calling for $2 billion for a new global pandemic prevention fund. However, the recent Biden budget request was only $250 million. This is simply not enough, and the fight continues. ​Currently, we’re also lobbying for the NOVID Act, which asks for $34 million to scale up global vaccination manufacturing and supply. We mobilized thousands of activists to send letters to President Biden in support of the TRIPS Waiver and co-sponsored in person direct action protests outside of Moderna and Pfizer headquarters this spring. Shoutout to our amazing team of Regional Organizers, State Captains, and state team members who helped make this happen. If you are interested in being a part of this exciting movement, be sure to check out our State Captain application and join our team! JOIN OUR TEAM Vaccine Equity We've assembled a "resource hub" of information related to vaccine equity and access. There are articles, websites, videos, and more to further your knowledge on this issue. Visit our website to learn more! [ARGUMENT] End the Pandemic Faster by Listening to Developing Countries [EDITORIAL] Suspend intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccines [VIDEO] Should Rich Countries Be Obligated to Share Their Vaccines? LEARN MORE Fundraising Update Celebrations are in order… For the first 100 days of the Biden-Harris Administration, Right to Health Action led a 100K in 100 Days fundraising campaign. We want to give a huge shout out to our 533 donors - because of your help, we were able to raise over $110,000! This campaign helped us build people power across the country, allowed us to hire paid staff to support our organizing efforts, and provided critical resources to sustain and grow our team at this urgent moment in history. You can still contribute to our campaign! Every dollar directly funds the organizers across the country who are at the very heart of this work. DONATE Activist Highlights One thing is certain—everything we accomplish is due to our incredible team of activists. We're so excited to share more about our team through “R2H Activist Highlights” to recognize these amazing people! Tulika Singh has a Masters of Public Health from Johns Hopkins and a PhD in virology and vaccinology from Duke University - we’re very excited for her as she begins her Postdoc at Stanford University! In addition to being our Fundraising Lead, Tulika works hard with R2H on the policy team to advocate for global access to medicines and pandemic prevention. Not to mention, she was also a leader of our successful 100K in 100Days fundraising campaign! We are so thankful for Tulika’s dedication and leadership at R2H. Sara is the Pennsylvania State Captain, a member of the policy team, our resident story-teller, and a proud stay-at-home mom of 5 children. Sara honors the memory of her father who passed from COVID-19 by sharing his story at meetings with members of Congress. She also plays an important role in ensuring that the voices of those directly affected by coronavirus are uplifted front and center in everything that R2H does. Thank you, Sara, for everything you contribute to our team! Thank you for being part of the Right to Health Action movement Want to receive regular updates from our team? Sign-up for our mailing list! SIGN-UP

Plan de prevención de pandemias populares El Congreso aprobará varios proyectos de ley relacionados con COVID-19 en esta sesión y la siguiente. Únase a nosotros y exija que estos proyectos de ley incluyan medidas para un Plan de Prevención de Pandemias nuevo y audaz: uno que detenga este brote, apoye una recuperación justa y tome las medidas internacionales necesarias para evitar que ocurran futuras pandemias. El próximo presidente de los Estados Unidos también debe adoptar un plan integral a la altura del momento. Donald Trump desea que el COVID-19 desaparezca mientras el país arde, e incluso el plan de Joe Biden tiene grandes vacíos que debemos estar organizando para llenar. La pandemia de COVID-19 está devastando a las personas pobres y marginadas en los Estados Unidos y en todo el mundo. La globalización empresarial y el cambio climático están provocando cada vez más pandemias y seguirán llegando cada vez más rápido. Algunos serán más contagiosos, otros serán más mortales. Algunos serán ambos. No tiene por qué ser así. No podemos detener el problema solo en Estados Unidos. Tampoco podemos hacerlo sin abordar las políticas de desigualdad y explotación que nos metieron en este lío; este momento exige una acción que responda a la escala del desafío. Insistimos en que el Congreso y el próximo presidente brinden alivio inmediato de COVID-19 y creen un cambio estructural duradero para prevenir futuras emergencias por pandemias. Nosotros demandamos: Una fuerza laboral de salud pública permanente de Community Care Corp, que crea cientos de miles de empleos sindicales permanentes para detener el COVID-19 y proteger la salud pública. Una garantía de medicamentos y vacunas asequibles que se necesitan con urgencia para todos, en todas partes, en lugar de medicamentos de alto precio ocultos detrás de las barreras del monopolio de patentes; y Los países ricos deben proporcionar fondos para los sistemas de salud y el apoyo comunitario en los países de ingresos bajos y medios para detener las pandemias donde comienzan y antes de que se propaguen. Acción para la transmisión zoonótica de puntos calientes globales donde las enfermedades pasan de los animales a los humanos, y una prohibición de las corporaciones irresponsables que venden productos de deforestación en los EE. UU. ¡Necesitamos todas las manos! ¡Juntos podemos ganar! Vaccine Equity News 1. Historic Global Fund for Pandemics launch 2.WHO and MPP announce agreement with NIH for COVID-19 health technologies 3. 170 Groups Call on WHO to reject TRIPS waiver non-deal 4. 223 NGOs Open Letter to Trade Ministers at WTO 5. 250+ public health, human rights, and consumer organizations call on governments to bypass WTO's prioritization of pharmaceutical monopolies over human lives Plan de prevención de pandemias populares Hear from Dr. Tom Frieden, former CDC Director, and Chris Noble on the R2H Organizing team about the current state of play for vaccinating the world and what is needed to ramp up our efforts to get shots in the arms to people everywhere. INVOLUCRARSE We convened the experts for a teach-in on vaccine equity and what needs to happen to ensure we can vaccinate EVERYONE as soon as possible, not just people in wealthy countries. Hear from our panelists: ​ Priti Radha Krishtel , a health justice lawyer and co-founder of I-MAK, a non-profit building a more just and equitable medicines system. Leena Menghaney , an activist with Medicine Sans Fronteir’s Access Campaign based in India (Otherwise known as Doctors Without Borders) Matthew Rose , a longstanding HIV and social justice advocate, policy wonk, and Director of U.S. Policy & Advocacy at Health GAP INVOLUCRARSE TRIPS waiver background [WATCH] Should Rich Countries Be Obligated to Share Their Vaccines? Listen to our upcoming panelist Priti Krishtel speak with Hari Sreenivasan about the need to rethink how patents are regulated. While the COVID-19 vaccine is readily available in the U.S., the UK and Israel, experts are saying that most of Africa and parts of South America and Asia will wait until 2023 for its inoculations. Health inequality was badly exposed during this pandemic, but Priti Krishtel says it doesn't have to be this way. She is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of the non-profit Initiative for Medicines, Access & Knowledge . INVOLUCRARSE [ARGUMENT] Tackling Pandemics Means Relearning the Lessons of Fighting HIV By Ethan Guillen and Emily Bass, R2H Action READ [WEBSITE] Prevent Epidemics provides clear and concise country-level data on epidemic preparedness Dr. Tom Frieden, President & CEO VISIT [PODCAST ] Is Racism Shaping the Global Vaccine Response? With Priti Krishtel, Tahir Amin and Asia Russell LISTEN [EDITORIAL] Suspend intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccines By Priti Krishtel READ [ARTICLE] First, the Waiver. Next, let’s Vaccinate the World. By Peter Maybarduk READ [REPORT] Hit Hard, Hit Fast, Hit Globally: A Model for Global Vaccine Access Prepared by PrEP4All READ [ARGUMENT] End the Pandemic Faster by Listening to Developing Countries By Ethan Guillen, R2H Action READ [OPINION] US Support for Vaccine Waiver Welcome, but More Needed By Jomo Kwame Sundaram READ [ARTICLE] The COVID-19 Vaccine Patent Waiver Fight Is Far From Over By Daniel Marans READ

FIRST OPINION : Biden should use emergency powers to license Covid-19 vaccine technologies to the WHO for global access BY JONATHAN SHAFFER • MARCH 25, 2021 President Biden’s aggressive new timetable for the sprint to full vaccine availability — his target for crossing the finish line is May 1 — is welcome news for Americans. But it obscures the fact that to truly protect people living in the United States, it’s essential to get shots into the arms of every person on the planet. ​ During the second week of March, the world had a chance to engage in multilateral collaboration to share the vaccine technology necessary to reach global herd immunity. At a general meeting of the World Trade Organization , South Africa and India proposed a waiver of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights agreement (TRIPS). That waiver would have temporarily suspended certain vaccine technology patent monopoly protections during the Covid-19 crisis and enabled access to the “recipe” and manufacturing protocols for effective vaccines to be shared with producers around the world. ​ But it was sabotaged by trade representatives from the U.S., the United Kingdom, and other wealthy countries in the Global North who argued that current intellectual property rights were crucial to maintaining innovation in the drug-development market. ​ Following the WTO’s failure to act, Biden’s best option to lead the world toward equitable vaccine access is by using his executive powers to extricate the Moderna, Pfizer, and Johnson & Johnson vaccine patents from the grip of stifling monopolies and license the Covid-19 vaccine technology to the World Health Organization’s Covid-19 Technology Access Pool , which would enable a rapid scale-up of generic vaccine manufacturing worldwide. This would give Biden a chance for a rare triple win: Licensing Covid-19 vaccine technologies to the pool would be a major victory for global social justice, a win for the self-interested American public, and a foreign policy victory for world order and stability. ​ Vaccine apartheid is an apt description of the injustice built into the current and persistent inequalities in vaccine access. The map of current Covid-19 vaccine access overlays neatly onto much older maps of colonial conquest. ​ A recent Kaiser Family Foundation report concluded that, “without redistribution of doses already purchased by high-income countries (through donations or other means) and/or increased support for manufacturing or production of additional doses, more than four in ten (41%) adults in the world will not be able to be vaccinated …” Patent protections for pharmaceutical companies like the Pfizer/BioNTech team, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson — whose Covid-19 vaccine development efforts were almost entirely funded by the U.S. and German governments — create unnecessary vaccine scarcity. By hoarding scarce vaccines, the U.S. and other Global North countries all but ensure continued concentration of Covid-19 risk, infection, and death among the most impoverished people in the world. ​ While the U.S. has committed to charitably contributing $4 billion to the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) program, which is funding vaccine distribution in the world’s poorest nations, and has given doses to Mexico and Canada, these efforts are a drop in the bucket of what is needed. The best-case scenarios put COVAX at being able to supply only about 20% of the vaccines needed to cover the world’s vulnerable populations. The current arrangement is not simply unjust for the global poor, it is also self-defeating for the wealthy, vaccinated world. By restricting the flow of Covid-19 vaccines, rich countries in the Global North are allowing SARS-CoV-2 to circulate unchecked in poor countries and driving the conditions that accelerate the number of new Covid-19 viral mutations. These variants may be more contagious, more deadly, have the ability to reinfect Covid-19 survivors, and/or be resistant to the vaccines that are currently available. It’s likely just a matter of time before these new variants become dominant in the U.S., undercutting existing protective immunity and dashing the Biden administration’s hopes for a speedy end to this grim chapter in our history. Ensuring that the world gets vaccinated is also a self-interested matter of safeguarding the hard-won protections of the already-vaccinated. ​ The world is beginning to see the political instability engendered by chronic, unchecked Covid-19 transmission. The U.S. is battling crises on all fronts, domestic and international. Accelerating global access to vaccines by licensing existing vaccines to the Covid-19 Technology Access Pool would be an essential and relatively easy win that builds on Biden’s own existing commitment to restoring global cooperation. ​ Brazil’s Covid-19 havoc , ensuing economic collapse, political denialism, and rising instability foreshadows a possible future in which ongoing economic stagnation, mass death, and political dysfunction accelerate global disorder. Biden should listen to people in his own administration, including Anthony Fauci, his chief medical adviser on the pandemic, who recently answered “Yes, yes, and yes” when asked whether the U.S. should join the Covid-19 Technology Access Pool. ​ Biden has repeatedly argued that the U.S. must regain its role as a global leader for justice and stability, and that internationally engaged leadership is the best way to keep Americans safe and prosperous. By licensing available vaccine technologies (which were largely financed by American taxpayers) to the pool, the Biden administration would immediately unlock untapped global vaccine production capacity. With multilateral efforts through the WTO now off the table, the president should use the emergency powers granted to him to bring American leadership once again to the world stage and at the same time avert catastrophe, promote justice, and protect the American people. ​ Jonathan Shaffer is a cofounder of Right to Health Action and a Ph.D. candidate in sociology at Boston University. ​

R2H Action February All Hands Meeting All Hands on Deck to Build a Pandemic Free Future! Featuring Kristin Urquiza with Marked By COVID Remarks from Sola Adenekan and R2H State Captain Tulika Singh WEDNESDAY • FEB 24, 2021 • 8:30PM ET | 5:30PM PT Join Right to Health Action for our first-ever All Hands Meeting on Wednesday, February 24th 2021. During this one-hour event, we will center ourselves in a vision for a pandemic free future and mobilize into powerful action around the People’s Pandemic Prevention Plan . ​ We are honored to welcome back Kristin Urquiza, co-founder of Marked By COVID , and Deputy Director of Mighty Earth, about harnessing her fear, anger and hopelessness about losing her father to fuel her actions to stop COVID-19, build back better and stop the pandemics of the future. We will also hear fierce stories about leveraging loss into action from award-winning filmmaker Sola Adenekan , as well as R2H Action State Captain Tulika Singh . We need all hands on deck in order to build a bold movement strong enough to tackle systemic issues of health inequity! We hope you will join us for this critical moment. ​