Progressives are calling for Biden to lift the coronavirus vaccine patent so poorer countries can produce their own supply.

"This is not a conversation about rich countries handing over their doses of the vaccine. This is a conversations about lifting, at least temporarily, patents so that technology companies share the technology and research necessary to produce the vaccines in some of these countries that have been unable to obtain, in some cases, even a single dose for their own people," explained Ana Kasparian.

But for months, the U.S. has joined Canada, the United Kingdom, and several other rich countries in blocking the patent waiver proposal first introduced at the World Trade Organization (WTO) last year by South Africa and India.

India and South Africa are leading efforts to temporarily waive the patent protections, and Biden is considering it. But the patents have still not been lifted.

"Two companies—AstraZeneca and Novavax—have allowed manufacturers in India, Japan, and South Korea to produce their vaccines under voluntary licensing agreements," reported Politico. "But the World Health Organization, which supports India and South Africa's waiver request, argues the terms of the voluntary license schemes being offered by some patent holders are not sufficient to address the current pandemic."

"We’re dealing with a global pandemic. So rich countries hoarding that tech for themselves isn't really going to help the situation, especially when our global supply chain relies on these countries -- countries like India," explained Kasparian.

She further noted, "You should be worried about people’s lives, but when you don't care about that, and you're more concerned about the profit seeking of pharmaceutical companies, consider the fact that not sharing this vaccine is going to have a negative domino effect on our economy, on our health."

Co-host Aida Rodriguez said when countries don't share resources, problems like immigration become even greater.

"When we do things like this that destabilize other countries, it forces people to have to come here because they are seeking something that they don't have in their own countries and this is the domino effect," she explained.

"When we think about not wanting to give the resources to other countries and then complain about why there are so many Indians in America. We should know these are the reasons why. Because the President of the United States is operating with his capitalistic mentality which is toxic for all of the people," she further explains.

So progressives are calling Biden to share the information on the scale necessary to deal with the global pandemic.

Reps. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Sanders, and dozens of other U.S. members of Congress have joined more than 400 grassroots advocacy organizations in urging Biden to end U.S. opposition to the waiver, which proponents say is necessary to distribute sufficient vaccine doses to developing countries.

The calls to lift patents has, of course, drawn strong opposition from the pharmaceutical industry, which is lobbying the Biden administration to continue rejecting the waiver proposal and leave vaccine production largely under the control of a small number of powerful corporations.

"When we’re not wanting to help India, coronavirus is not going to get better in Montana because this is the stuff that happens that affects the people throughout the world. Wuhan is not down the street from here - and yet I have friends who have died of coronavirus right here," concluded Rodriguez.