#BTEditorial – Needs should guide fair access to COVID-19 vaccine

It is becoming increasingly apparent that the global jostle for COVID-19 vaccines will be another battle of might and wealth over the needs of the world’s most vulnerable and at risk.

Recently leaked documents have exposed deep concerns that countries like Barbados and other developing nations could find their access to the vital vaccinations stalled for another three years, thus stymying any chances of a smooth pathway out of the health and economic crisis now gripping their economies.

It is being reported that the global scheme to deliver COVID-19 vaccines to poorer countries faces a “very high” risk of failure, potentially leaving nations that are home to billions of people with no access to vaccines until as late as 2024.

This is not the kind of revelation that we are expecting as the New Year approaches and hopes for an economic recovery are emerging.

Too much is riding on developing nations’ access to these vaccines. They not only represent a significant scientific breakthrough but are now the most expensive drug produced in recent times and an important factor is resurgence from the economic shocks.

The World Health Organisation’s (WHO) has designed what has been branded the COVAX programme which is the main global scheme to vaccinate people in poor and middle-income countries against the novel coronavirus.

The aim of the WHO programme is to deliver a minimum of 2 billion vaccine doses by the end of 2021 and that was expected to cover approximately 20 per cent of the most vulnerable people in 91 poor and middle-income countries, mostly in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

But now that expectations have been raised and the global public relations campaigns launched to achieve buy-in for the vaccines, we learn that those in charge of rolling out the COVAX scheme say the programme is struggling from a lack of funds, supply risks and complex contractual arrangements which could make it impossible to achieve the main goals.

Some will argue, that this development was expected. He who pays the piper calls the tune.

“The risk of a failure to establish a successful COVAX Facility is very high,” said the internal report to the board of Gavi, an alliance of governments, drug companies, charities and international organisations that arranges global vaccination campaigns. Gavi co-leads COVAX alongside the WHO.

The risk of failure is said to be higher because the scheme was set up so quickly and operated in “uncharted territory”.

Global charities such as OXFAM have already signalled great worry about the fate of people living in poorer nations. The group claims that 70 poor countries will only be able to vaccinate one in 10 per cent of their citizens against COVID-19 next year unless urgent action is taken by governments and the pharmaceutical industry to make sure enough doses are produced, the campaigners urged.

We are well aware that 10 per cent vaccination in a population does not create the immunity required to keep citizens safe.

What larger industrialised countries ought to realise is that unless all the world is protected from COVID-19 no country is safe from the disease.

Against this backdrop, we are aghast to learn that while poor countries can only get enough vaccines to cover 10 per cent of their populations, wealthier nations have bought up enough doses of COVID-19 vaccines to vaccinate their entire populations nearly three times over by the end of 2021 if those currently in clinical trials are approved for use.

Canada tops the chart with enough vaccines to cover each Canadian five times. Moreover, additional data show that rich nations representing just 14 per cent of the world’s population have bought up 53 per cent of all the most promising vaccines so far.

We in Barbados and the region are comforted by suggestions that some form of collective bargaining is taking place to ensure Caribbean people are not left on the periphery of the COVID relief plan.

Prime Minister Mia Mottley who has skillfully developed her international profile since coming to office in 2018, will have to leverage some of that global capital she now commands to ensure that Barbadians will be protected from this COVID-19 plague as we seek to fully reopen the economy and kick start the important tourism and hospitality trade that is so vital to our economic survival.