Vaccine shots: not the kind of shots you desperately wanted after a year and a half (and still going) of pandemic-related despair, but the ones you needed. It is accurate to state that the beginning of mass vaccination represented somewhat of a turning point in the course of the current COVID-19 pandemic. After a record-breaking time of intense studies, research and intricate test phases, a handful of vaccines were made available for countries to buy and acquire vaccines from the different suppliers, major producers such as Pfizer-BioNTech, Oxford-AstraZeneca, Janssen (or Johnson & Johnson), among other pharma companies and laboratories.
I must admit that by this time when vaccines were starting to pop up like pimples in a high school, I thought these vaccines were heralds of the beginning of the end of this dreadful pandemic. However, just as every single Game of Thrones character who experienced some form of betrayal followed by a gruesome but creative execution, I did not know any better.
If the phrase disappointed but not surprised was a crisis, it would definitely be the vaccine inequality crisis.
The vaccine roll-out went as expected, considering humankind’s natural talent in the art of self-sabotage. Rich countries completely hoarded the production lines with massive pre-orders, which basically meant that countries that did not place the bid as fast were forced to wait several months in order to be able to purchase even small quantities of vaccines; this was the international relations equivalent of the PS5 launch.
This has some dangerous moral and civil issues but I will approach this in a more objective manner.
Let’s start with the word pandemic, shall we? According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, pandemics are “an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area (such as multiple countries or continents) and typically affects a significant proportion of the population”.
This is important because it means that a pandemic is NOT an individual problem, meaning that as long as a single country is affected the rest of the world is in danger as well. For example, in your group of friends even if only one person that is always like “OMG you HAVEN’T seen Money Heist??!!” you are all in danger of having to do a Money Heist marathon against your will.
Therefore, from a public health perspective, it doesn’t make any sense to (deliberately or not) prevent less resourceful countries to have access to vaccines.
When a rich country is considering to go full Black Friday on the vaccine market, it is also important to consider the economic harms that a partially vaccinated world causes to global markets and economics. Most wealthy countries import a lot of raw goods from developing countries. Nevertheless, those same commerce lines are dependent of the exporting end; non-functioning economies and infrastructures hurt by a ravaging pandemic cannot meet those same demands.
As the Director-General of the World Health Organization stated: “Economically, epidemiologically and morally, it is in all countries' best interest to use the latest available data to make lifesaving vaccines available to all.”
It is unfair to mention only the buyers since deals are made between more than one party. Remember those big-time producers about 400 words ago? The seller ultimately controls the product and its price, so a great deal of responsibility falls upon pharma companies that supply vaccines at an unreasonable price. The three major vaccine sellers made in one year a combined total of 45 – 60 billion USD.
By pointing out the previous facts, I am not downplaying the fantastic and critical help that these companies and laboratories provided in order to fight the pandemic. I am, however, arguing that this was also an opportunity that these companies misused to make an extraordinary amount of money with disregard on how that would affect several struggling countries.
To conclude, what can be done? From vaccine donations between countries to price changes and regulations by producers, there are a lot of ways to mitigate this global problem.
One thing that is truly important is to keep in mind that we have not ended this pandemic yet but also to keep in mind that we can, if we remember that this is something that ALL of us have to overcome.
At least until an Omega variant comes along and just pulls some Power Rangers’ shenanigans with the Alpha variant and humankind is wiped off the planet.
Francisco Moura
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