On May 12, 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) COVID-19 Technology Access Pool and the Medicines Patent Pool finalized a licensing agreement with the U.S. National Institutes of Health for the development of several innovative therapeutics, early-stage vaccines and diagnostic tools for COVID-19.

The licenses, which were transparented, global and non-exclusive, allowed manufacturers from around the world to work with MPP and C-TAP to make these technologies accessible to people living in low- and middle-income countries and help put an end to the pandemic.

The 11 COVID-19 technologies offered under two licenses include the stabilized spike protein used in currently available COVID-19 vaccines, research tools for vaccine, therapeutic and diagnostic development as well as early-stage vaccine candidates and diagnostics.

The announcement was made today by the US Government at the second Global COVID-19 Summit, co-hosted by the United States, Belize, Germany, Indonesia and Senegal.

Licensing the NIH technologies to MPP under the auspices of C-TAP will allow greater access to these technologies and hopefully lead to the development of commercial products that can address current and future public health needs. In most circumstances, NIH will not collect royalties on sales of products licensed in 49 countries classified by the United Nations as Least Developed Countrie