Not under any treaty obligation. DRC shares Bundibugyo sequence data under existing WHO mechanisms, but the PABS annex that would guarantee benefit-sharing in return remains deadlocked. CEPI's $62m vaccine funding carries no guaranteed DRC-priority access.Source: WHO/CEPI

When will the PABS annex to the WHO Pandemic Agreement be finalised?

WHA79 (May 2026) deferred finalisation to WHA80 in May 2027, with IGWG7 (6-17 July 2026) as the next negotiating session. Six previous sessions have failed to resolve the mandatory versus voluntary benefit-sharing impasse.Source: WHA79 resolution

What is PABS and why is it blocking the WHO Pandemic Agreement?

PABS is the unresolved annex setting rules for pathogen sample-sharing and equitable distribution of resulting vaccines. The Agreement adopted at WHA78 in May 2025 cannot be signed under Article 31(2) without PABS resolved. WHA79 deferred adoption to 2027.Source: WHO

Background

Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) is the annex to the WHO Pandemic Agreement that would establish legally binding rules for two interlinked obligations: pathogen sharing (the obligation of member states to rapidly share pathogen samples and sequence data with WHO and the global research community during a pandemic emergency) and benefit-sharing (the obligation of vaccine and pharmaceutical manufacturers that use those samples to return a share of resulting medical countermeasures to the countries that provided the pathogens, particularly lower-income countries). The logic is a negotiated exchange: you share the virus, you get access to the tools it makes possible.

PABS has been the central fault line in WHO Pandemic Agreement negotiations since the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) process began in 2022. High-income countries and pharmaceutical industry voices have sought non-binding commitments and market-based distribution mechanisms; lower-income countries, led by the African Group, have insisted on mandatory dose-sharing, technology transfer, and intellectual property waiver as the price of rapid sample-sharing. The predecessor WHO PIP Framework (2011), triggered by H1N1, established a voluntary model for influenza that lower-income countries regard as having failed them during COVID-19.

The 79th World Health Assembly (May 2026) formally deferred PABS adoption to WHA80 in May 2027, with IGWG7 scheduled for 6-17 July 2026 as the next attempt . The Bundibugyo outbreak has turned PABS from an abstract negotiation into a live test case: DRC is sharing Bundibugyo sequence data in real time under existing mechanisms, but with no treaty-guaranteed right to the vaccines CEPI is now funding with $62 million . The WHO Pandemic Agreement cannot enter into force under Article 31(2) until PABS is adopted; one year after the Agreement's WHA78 adoption, no country has signed .

IGWG7, the seventh Intergovernmental Working Group session on the WHO Pandemic Agreement, opened in Geneva on 6 July 2026, running to 17 July, for another attempt at the deadlocked PABS annex. On 15 June, Brazilian President Lula and WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus co-signed an open letter to the G7, G20 and BRICS, naming 17 July "a Deadline, not a milestone": the first time a head of state has put his name to the PABS push, after two earlier WHO-only extensions in March and May. The letter named the three unresolved issues plainly: how benefits are shared, how the system is governed, and how equity is guaranteed.