shareholder resolution · 2022
Oxfam America at Moderna, Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson
At Moderna and Pfizer, asked the board to commission a third-party report analysing the feasibility of promptly transferring intellectual property and technical know-how so that additional qualified manufacturers in low and middle income countries could produce COVID-19 vaccine doses. At Johnson & Johnson, asked the board to report on whether and how its subsidiary Janssen's receipt of government financial support for developing and manufacturing vaccines and therapeutics affected access to them.
What happened
Result: All three proposals were voted down at meetings held on 28 April 2022. Moderna's Proposal 4 drew 70,878,392 votes for and 227,007,857 against, with 1,518,730 abstentions and 34,671,090 broker non-votes, which is 23.8% of the votes cast for and against. Pfizer's Item 6 drew 1,023,141,083 for and 2,714,524,824 against, or 27.4%. Johnson & Johnson's Item 8 drew 616,715,019 for and 1,207,732,861 against, or 33.8%. Oxfam put the Moderna figure at 24 percent of the nominal vote and 29 percent of the independent vote, once the 17 percent held by the company's directors and senior executives is set aside, and said it was the first time shareholders had voted for a resolution of this kind on any company proxy ballot.
We found no change by any of the three companies that a source we opened attributes to these votes. Johnson & Johnson did not announce vote totals at its meeting and filed them with the Securities and Exchange Commission afterwards. The account of company responses that the earlier version of this row carried, on doses to COVAX and the African Union, the Biovac partnership and nonprofit-basis distribution, rested entirely on a Fierce Pharma article that no longer opens, live or through the Internet Archive, so it is not restated here.
Who is involved
- Oxfam America filer
- People's Vaccine Alliance co-filer
- Moderna company
- Pfizer Inc. company
- Johnson & Johnson company
What this campaign is about
- Science and technology cooperation Helpful · UN Sustainable Development Goals
- Vaccine and medicine R&D and access Necessary · UN Sustainable Development Goals
- Universal health coverage and affordable medicines Necessary · UN Sustainable Development Goals
- Offers fair pricing Pivotal · JUST Capital
- Health Necessary · Doughnut Economics
- Let the government override patents on unaffordable, federally funded drugs Necessary · Common Ground of the American People