Coronavirus: Cases expected to rise as new variant surges in Europe

Yahoo Finance reporter Anjalee Khemlani details the latest news on COVID-19 and how cases are expected to rise due to the emergence of a new variant in Europe.

Video Transcript

RACHELLE AKUFFO: Welcome back to Yahoo Finance Live. Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel has reportedly sold about 2.8 million shares of the company, worth more than $400 million since the start of the pandemic. CNBC reports that Bancel began unloading about $3.6 million in stock a week in January of 2020. The shares skyrocketed on the development of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine. Now Bancel's sales are executed under an SEC rule intended to prevent insider trading. Moderna's stock is up over 600% since the company first announced it was working on the vaccine.

BRAD SMITH: A new COVID variant has been discovered with scientists including-- and well, concluding here, a combination of known variants were the reasons for the newest strain. Yahoo Finance health reporter Anjalee Khemlani has more of these details for us. Anjalee, what do we need to know about this?

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Well, Brad, what I would say is, of course, on one hand, we've got Deltacron, which is that combination of a Delta and Omicron variant. And on the other hand, we've got the [INAUDIBLE] Omicron subvariant that is causing a lot of concern overseas, as well as here in the US. That is behind what we're seeing are surges both in China, as well as parts of Europe. And that is why Biden health officials and other White House officials are really looking at what's going on there to what it might mean for the US.

Some reports suggesting that we might see yet another surge by this spring, which is kind of one of the earliest predictions. There were some suggesting it might go out until summer. We're already starting to pick up an increase in cases through wastewater surveillance. And that's one of the parameters that the CDC looks at. The other, of course, being testing, but that, as it has shifted more to at home and, broadly speaking, has reduced around the world, is cause for concern by the World Health Organization, which said that this is possibly, quote, "just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the full picture of what exactly is going on with COVID."

Also incoming White House COVID-19 response team director Dr. Ashish Jha tweeted today that, quote, "We are not done. We are very likely to see more surges of infections. We may see more variants. We can't predict everything with certainty, but we have to prepare to protect the American people, whatever Mother Nature throws at us," pretty much summing up sort of where things are right now.

BRAD SMITH: And Anjalee, one of those protections has been the widespread availability of vaccinations. And for some of the vaccines that we've seen thus far, there's been a ton of research and development that's gone into them, we do know. However, that also comes with a ton of intellectual property that many of the companies would like to hold onto. However, some of them moving to open source them. So where do we stand on the intellectual property side of these vaccines?

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Well, what we know is that since the past year, we've seen at the World Trade Organization, there's been a push to really present a waiver of the patents. And that has come to some fruition. There is an agreement now between the US, EU, India, and South Africa that would basically allow for COVID-19 vaccines to be domestically produced without patent consent of the patent holder. And that would be for three to five years. It would only affect developing countries who have accounted for less than 10% of 2021 global exports.

That excludes China, but it's important to note it includes India, which, while it does house the world's largest vaccine maker, did have a ban on exports in 2021, as it suffered through the Delta wave. So it actually qualifies India there. Predictably, the drug organizations are quite against this, saying that it would stifle innovation in the future and sends the wrong message. Meanwhile, public health advocates are saying that it's not going far enough, that it should include treatments, which the World Trade Organization did note that it could expand to include in about six months.

So that's where things stand now. We're waiting, of course, on the agreement among the 164 members of the World Trade Organization. Meanwhile, interesting news on the patent front when it comes to Pfizer's COVID-19 oral treatment, Paxlovid. That, 35 generic drug makers have hopped on board to produce it globally at a cheaper cost. And we have seen that this is sort of part of an agreement that Pfizer had back in November, allowing for a voluntary license that would affect 53% of the world's population.

Part of the agreement, which is through the Medicines Patent Pool, backed by the UN, is that they would have these countries that could produce it and then provide it to the rest of the world. And we had CEO Albert Bourla of Pfizer earlier tweeting, quote, "Bottom line, for as long as the pandemic lasts, Pfizer will not profit from the sales of the treatment." And this affects mostly the lower income countries, and the sales from them is what Pfizer will not profit for, as long as the public emergency is in place. Back to you.

BRAD SMITH: OK, and so it sounds like many of these companies are simply waiting for the WHO or for specific countries to also step off of the emergency or public health crisis classification or the WHO to move away from the pandemic classification here then.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: That's right, yeah. So that would be sort of the end of any goodwill, if you will, when it comes to providing any patented technology to these lower income countries or to the developing world at large. We know that also in the background, of course, the World Health Organization has been working on that South Africa mRNA hub. But a lot of this is set to really not come to fruition until later this year or next year. So it also depends on where we are in the pandemic. By then, we could still be in it, as we see that vaccinations in some parts of the world are really low. So it really is, just as I've been saying for the past few years, a wait and see.