In Atlas Shrugged, Hank Rearden goes to tremendous effort to create a revolutionary metal alloy. Rather than respect his property rights, Big Government employs extortion to acquire the formula. Ayn Rand’s epic novel is coming true:

The [Biden Regime] said Wednesday it would support the temporary waiver of intellectual property provisions to allow developing nations to produce Covid-19 vaccines created by pharmaceutical companies, citing an urgent need to stem the pandemic.

Pharmaceutical companies performed a miracle by creating the vaccines so quickly. They were able to thanks in part to Trump getting Big Government out of their way, reducing red tape through Operation Warp Speed. Personified by the unscrupulous and ham-fisted Joe Biden, Big Government is back.

The ChiCom virus has been running amok in India, to the delight of Chinese officials. Stealing the vaccine is no instant fix, if only because setting up complex production facilities in India and elsewhere will take time. It will also weaken supply chains and may result in counterfeit vaccines. It will prevent future pharmaceutical breakthroughs, as the expense and risk of developing new drugs will not be worthwhile if bureaucrats will merely seize the drug once it has been created.

This won’t come as a surprise:

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, hailed the U.S. action as a “monumental moment” in the fight against Covid-19.

Tedros is a literal communist who has been accused of genocide. The WHO is essentially a tool of the Chinese Communist Party, which is why Trump cut its US funding and Biden immediately restored it.

Communist countries don’t develop new drugs the way the USA and other free countries do, because they do not have property rights.

Even Bill Gates, normally a globalist moonbat, knows this thuggery is not going to fix the problem:

“The thing that has holding things back in this case is not intellectual property. It’s not like there’s some idle vaccine factory, with regulatory approval, that makes magically safe vaccines,” Bill Gates, whose charitable foundation has made significant contributions to global vaccine efforts, said on Sky News last month.

This was predictable:

Shares of Pfizer, Moderna and several other vaccine developers fell sharply in response. The selloff continued Thursday morning. …

[I]ntellectual property is the backbone of the drug industry. Investors should take any challenge to it seriously.

The price of letting Biden’s handlers take power will go beyond skyrocketing taxes, debt, and inflation. This catastrophic mistake will cost us our future health, as pharmaceutical companies are reduced to aspirin mills that cannot make a profit on new drugs.

On tips from Varla and Mr. Freemarket.

Comments are closed.