Hi everyone,
Hope you are doing well. I read a concept recently called “vaccine nationalism“, which reminds me of the space race between the United States and the Soviet Union back in the 1960s. Right now, companies are developing vaccines that are getting high injections of funding from their home countries, which is speeding up the efforts for the development and manufacturing. For example, Britain became the first country to roll out the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine on December 08, 2020.
The issue is that high and middle income countries are reserving doses of the vaccines for their respective nations. In exchange for funds to develop the vaccines, the companies agreed to give certain countries priority access by reserving them. These are bilateral deals between governments and vaccine makers, known as “advance market commitments”– this is even before the vaccines are approved. The issue is that “when high-income countries take a large slice of that pie, there’s less pie for everyone else.” High income nations have the capacity to enter into these agreements, which increases the global inequality gap because poorer nations (most vulnerable to the COVID-19 catastrophe) are further disadvantaged. “The U.S., for example, has entered into at least six of these bilateral deals, totaling more than 1 billion doses—more than enough to inoculate the entire American population”, which means that some countries are taking more than they need, which means less resources for already disadvantaged nations.
Justin Trudeau, along with other Head of States (such as South Korea, New Zealand, and Ethiopia) plea for an equitable and transparent global distribution of vaccines, including “ including for humanitarian settings and other vulnerable countries such as the least developed countries and small island developing states .” They argue that all citizens have the right to health and safety, and shouldn’t be given more or less priority because of their nationality, that COVID-19 poses a risk to all
I feel conflicted with this issue, and understand both perspectives. Is it possible to have both? Can we have enough doses for every Canadian, while keeping an eye on the global vaccination distribution and ensuring that less developed nations are also given priority. Because COVID-19 is a worldwide pandemic. Every death outside the Canadian border is still a loss of life, so I wonder if both are achievable.
Many thanks,
Guest
