Mark Warner was interviewed on iHeartRadio’s The Late Showgram with Jim Richards about the U.S. decision to negotiate a “waiver” from the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)for COVID19 vaccines and the evolving Canadian government response. (May 6th & 7th, 2021) Mr. Warner is a Canadian and U.S. lawyer who has practiced in Toronto, Washington, D.C., New York and Brussels and has advised governments on trade policy and trade negotiations and previously worked on trade and competition issues as counsel in the OECD Trade Directorate. At the OECD, Mark participated in the negotiations of the proposed Multilateral Agreement on Investment and represented the OECD at meetings of the WTO Working Groups on Trade and Competition Policies and Trade and Investment Policies.

Mr. Warner has assisted pharmaceutical clients in the global distribution of HIV / AIDS anti-retroviral drugs and the development of innovative patient access programs in the developing world, advised a U.S.-based pharmaceutical company and its French and South African subsidiaries in a cartel investigation involving 11 leading global Pharmaceutical companies in South Africa and advised a U.S.-based pharmaceutical company on competition law issues relating to the distribution of various nuclear medicine imaging agents in Canada. Mr. Warner was Legal Director of the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development & Trade and advised Ontario on the negotiations of the Canada-EU Trade Agreement (CETA) including on IP, patent litigation and drug reimbursement issues and on economic development, research and innovation grants and loans to corporations, including leading global pharmaceutical companies for research, manufacture and clinical trial projects. As Legal Director of the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation, Mr. Warner also led Ontario’s legal team in creating the $250 million Ontario Emerging Technologies Fund with an emphasis on life-sciences companies, drafted funding agreements, including for the Ontario Research Fund and Ontario Brain Institute, and advised on legal and corporate governance issues in the formation of Clinical Trials Ontario.

In addition, as MEDT Legal Director, Mark led the Ontario’s legal team for the insolvency / restructuring of General Motors and Chrysler in the difficult context of the 2008-2009 Recession.

[Listen to the May 6th Interview on the U.S. Decision from from 17:20]

[Listen to the May 7th Interview on the Canadian Response from from 23:36]