Why The Future Of mRNA Must Be Global
The emergence of messenger RNA (mRNA) technology during the global crisis was a scientific triumph.
mRNA technology, known initially for its pivotal role in rapidly delivering safe and effective protection against COVID-19, had profound utility but only scratched the surface of its true potential.
This isn’t merely a vaccine innovation; it’s a revolutionary genetic messenger that instructs our cells to fight, adapt, and heal.
Today, mRNA is moving far beyond infectious diseases. Researchers are pioneering its use to treat debilitating conditions like cancer, certain immune diseases, and even neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, because of its unique ability to be rapidly customised and personalised.
Its ability to develop targeted treatments in weeks, not years, is a game-changer for conditions where time is crucial. This technology represents one of the most powerful and versatile tools in modern medical history.
This extraordinary, life-saving potential, however, presents a profound moral and operational challenge. However, the pandemic exposed that innovation without equitable access is a global failure.
For mRNA to truly deliver on its promise to protect all people from the next inevitable pandemic and the widespread endemic diseases that plague communities, we cannot allow its benefits to be confined by borders.
We must look beyond the laboratory and urgently make the case for immediate, systemic change to dismantle the economic, political, and logistical barriers that limit access.
The time for passive reliance on imports is over; the future of this world-changing technology must be built on a foundation of global self-reliance.
The Inequity Gap: When Science Meets Scarcity
While scientists have brilliantly solved the fundamental challenge of getting the fragile mRNA molecule into human cells, significant scientific and political barriers keep this breakthrough tragically out of reach for billions of people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
This systemic failure undermines the very goal of global health security.
- Logistical Hurdles: The Fragility Of The Messenger
At its root, mRNA’s scientific nature creates its biggest real-world obstacle. Messenger RNA is an intrinsically unstable molecule, extremely prone to rapid degradation by pervasive enzymes (RNases). For the therapy to survive the journey from the factory to the arm, it must be protected, often encapsulated in delivery vehicles such as lipid nanoparticles (LNPs). This necessity dictates the need for a complex, costly ultra-cold chain. Maintaining the required low temperatures throughout manufacturing, transportation, and storage requires extensive, reliable energy infrastructure and specialised equipment. In regions with unreliable power grids and fragile road networks, this scientific reality translates directly into an operational failure, causing doses to spoil and making widespread, affordable distribution nearly impossible.
- The Intellectual Property Barrier
Beyond the challenges of molecular stability, the most significant political obstacle is the concentration of power created by Intellectual Property (IP) frameworks. Patents and proprietary “know-how” hold the technical keys to production, effectively creating a choke-point that prevents rapid, decentralised manufacturing. Its progress is quickly hitting a massive legal barrier known as the “patent thicket”
“A patent thicket is “an overlapping set of patent rights” which requires innovators to reach licensing deals for multiple patents. This concept has negative connotations and has been described as “a dense web of overlapping intellectual property rights that a company must hack its way through in order to actually commercialise new technology”
This isn’t just one patent; it’s a huge, complex pile of overlapping rights covering every part of the technology, from the tiny lipid shells to the actual genetic sequences.
For any country or manufacturer hoping to produce their own generic versions, this web of ownership means they need permission (and likely must pay) multiple rights holders. This fundamentally slows down innovation and, most critically, restricts the essential transfer of technology to the regions that need it most.
- Financial And Regulatory Barriers
Finally, even when technical knowledge is shared, scaling local production capacity faces immense practical barriers. Establishing state-of-the-art facilities requires massive capital investment, often running into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Coupled with this is the systemic weakness of local regulatory agencies. Without robust, internationally recognised regulatory bodies and clear approval pathways, new local manufacturers struggle to operate, making sustainable regional production a prohibitively risky endeavour.
The Pivot To Empowerment: Building Capacity In Africa
The global health community recognised that simply waiting for charitable vaccine donations was both morally bankrupt and strategically unsustainable.
This realisation led to a powerful shift: moving past dependency and towards regional self-reliance. The core solution is the mRNA Technology Transfer Programme, a visionary initiative co-led by the WHO and the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP).
At the heart of this global network is the mRNA Technology Transfer Hub based in Cape Town, South Africa. Led by a consortium including Afrigen Biologics, Biovac, and the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC), this hub is more than a single factory; it’s a living laboratory.
Crucially, the Afrigen-led hub has successfully developed its own open-source mRNA vaccine technology from scratch. This achievement is vital because it bypasses the IP blockades that halted global production during the pandemic.
The ambition of this program is to foster sustainable regional production and ensure preparedness for future health emergencies. But the true purpose extends far beyond just COVID-19.
The aim is to create a versatile, foundational mRNA platform that can be quickly retooled to combat diseases that disproportionately threaten LMICs. This includes urgent targets such as malaria, tuberculosis, and viral hemorrhagic fevers, focusing research and development efforts where human need is greatest. By developing this platform, countries gain the long-term ability to protect their populations from regional health priorities.
The hub acts as the engine, transferring its technology, expertise, and operational know-how to a growing network of 14 manufacturing partners, or “Spokes.”
These partners span six WHO regions, including Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt, Brazil, and India. This transfer involves intensive training, support with quality management and regulatory compliance, and assistance in building the legal frameworks necessary to operate.
The goal is to ensure that these partners gain the full spectrum of skills needed—the “know-how” to independently produce safe and effective health products—demonstrating a powerful shift toward self-determination in global health.
The Path Forward: Commitment Over Charity
The success of regional global access to mRNA technology relies heavily on unwavering political and financial commitment.
We must define true know-how transfer holistically, moving past basic documentation to share operational secrets and provide long-term, comprehensive training.
Policymakers and NGOs must guarantee sustainable investment to fund the entire ecosystem, regulatory strengthening, and workforce development far beyond the current crisis. This isn’t charity; it’s recognising that global health security is indivisible. Investing in equitable mRNA access is, therefore, the smartest collective insurance policy we can buy.
