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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal"><a name="m_-5073717849861431093__Hlk77259932" rel="noreferrer"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 15, 2021 CONTACT: Derrick Robinson,
</span></a><a href="mailto:drobinson@citizen.org" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:windowtext">drobinson@citizen.org</span></span><span></span></a><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">
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<span><b><span lang="EN" style="font-size:15.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Biden-Merkel Summit Fail: Pres. Biden Unable to End Germany’s Blockade of COVID WTO TRIPS Waiver He Seeks to End Pandemic<u></u><u></u></span></b></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today President Joe Biden and German Chancellor Angela Merkel held a news conference
after their business meetings at the White House. Germany has blocked 140 other nations, including the U.S., that seek an emergency waiver of WTO-enforced intellectual property barriers that limit greater production of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments necessary
to save millions of lives.<b> Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch Director Lori Wallach issued the following statement:</b></span></i></span><span><span lang="EN" style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><u></u><u></u></span></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal"><span><span lang="EN" style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">“For Merkel to get a high-profile White House victory lap and have
</span></span><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Pres. Biden proclaim that she ‘never
</span></span><span><span lang="EN" style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">fails to stand for human dignity’ while Biden has failed to get Merkel to stop blocking the WTO COVID vaccine waiver delivers
a punishing blow to efforts to end the pandemic, and it comes in a week when COVID deaths have surged 40% in Africa over the previous week, as
</span></span><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">the Delta variant is causing terrifying new waves of preventable death throughout the developing world where very few people have access
to vaccines or any protection. <u></u><u></u></span></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal"><span><span lang="EN" style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">“Germany is directly undermining Biden’s notion that the two nations show that ‘democracy is
delivering the needs of the people’ by blocking the will of the majority of people in the world who want a waiver of WTO-enforced monopolies that now empower Big Pharma to limit production of the COVID-19 vaccines and treatments that are necessary to save
the lives and livelihoods of millions of people worldwide. That means the mRNA vaccine technology that currently only the U.S. and Germany have approved is inaccessible to most in the world while non-democracies China and Russia are sharing their vaccine technology
and financing new COVID manufacturing plants around the world.</span></span><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><u></u><u></u></span></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal"><span><span lang="EN" style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">“People around the world dying for lack of vaccines were relying on Biden to get Merkel to stop
blocking the waiver given that he promised that if elected president, he wouldn’t allow Big Pharma monopolies to block global vaccine and treatment access. Biden’s inability to get Merkel to join him in supporting the waiver means tens of millions of lives
and livelihoods worldwide are left in peril, including here, given that raging COVID outbreaks anywhere increase the chances for an vaccine-resistant strain emerging. We urge the president to redouble his efforts to get the waiver enacted.
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;background:white"><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">“With his support for the waiver, Biden showed the world the U.S. was back,
but to show global leadership, Biden had to get Germany to stop blocking what he says is a U.S. priority to save tens of millions of lives. This summit was a failure, and we urge Biden to prioritize getting the WTO waiver enacted ASAP so more COVID vaccines
and treatments can be produced worldwide.</span></span><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><u></u><u></u></span></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;background:white"><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">“Biden’s failure to move Merkel on the COVID vaccine waiver means he has
a lot more work to do to end the pandemic, and as far Merkel, the world expected her to be leading with Biden, South Africa’s and France’s presidents and India’s Prime Minister to unlock the greater global vaccine and treatment production worldwide necessary
to stop the pandemic, not blocking the rest of the world and threatening to replace her refugee-crisis-legacy as a humanitarian with the image of a Big Pharma shill prioritizing corporate monopolies over millions of people’s lives.”</span></span><span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><u></u><u></u></span></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:normal;background:white"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">Merkel’s U.S. visit was met with
</span></i></span><a href="https://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/merkelprotests0715/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">dozens of protests</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><span class="m_-5073717849861431093MsoHyperlink"><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">
organized by Public Citizen, Citizens Trade Campaign and allied organization</span></i></span></span><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">, including the chancellor being
</span></i></span><a href="https://twitter.com/WallachLori/status/1415715409836269572" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">directly challenged by protestors</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">
as she arrived for an honorary degree at Johns Hopkins that </span></i></span><a href="https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/angela-merkels-refusal-is-killing-millions-she-doesnt-deserve-an-honorary-degree/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">students
petitioned against</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> given her waiver opposition, a
</span></i></span><a href="https://apimages.photoshelter.com/galleries/C0000RBwJpp4Ypcc/G0000u5lz7eAuys0/Protests-against-Merkel-s-opposition-to-Covid-vaccine-waiver-during-DC-visit-wire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">White
House banner lift</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> before she arrived and
</span></i></span><a href="https://apimages.photoshelter.com/galleries/C0000SRiGX3lf2FQ/G0000_YyX.BKDR2s/2021-07-15-Nationwide-Protests-of-Merkel-Visit-as-Germany-Blocks-WTO-Waiver-Sought-By-U-S-Wire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">die-in
the day of the summit</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">, a major
</span></i></span><a href="https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/nation/2021/07/14/protesters-demand-patent-waivers-covid-vaccine/7969593002/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">New
York city protest</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">
</span></i></span><a href="https://truthout.org/articles/pfizer-is-upholding-global-vaccine-apartheid-today-we-risk-arrest-to-stop-it/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">with
hundreds</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> at the German UN mission and
</span></i></span><a href="https://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/blog/2021/06/22/demonstrations-against-vaccine-apartheid-planned-during-german-chancellor-merkels-visit-to-us/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">protests
at more than a dozen German consulates nationwide</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black">.
</span></i></span><a href="https://www.citizen.org/article/letter-to-potus-on-chancellor-merkel-summit-and-covid-19-trips-waiver/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">Heads
of major U.S. organizations wrote to Biden</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> and
</span></i></span><a href="https://www.citizen.org/article/video-press-conference-global-leaders-urge-merkel-biden-to-solve-trips-waiver-block/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">spoke
at a press conference</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> to urge him to exert U.S. leadership at the
summit and resolve the German blockade. A </span></i></span><a href="https://schakowsky.house.gov/media/press-releases/schakowsky-colleagues-request-meeting-merkel-discuss-european-union-blocking" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer"><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:#4472c4">request
by members of the U.S. House of Representatives</span></i></span><span></span></a><span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;color:black"> for a meeting with
Merkel on the issue was rejected. </span></i></span><span></span><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><u></u><u></u></span></p>
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