More money available to manage COVID-19 pandemic

Barbados has a new source of funding to help it effectively manage the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Tuesday, the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) in association with the European Investment Bank (EIB) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), paving the way for CDB borrowing member states, including Barbados, to access funding to purchase vaccines and invest in equipment and initiatives to strengthen their health care systems.

Through a restructuring of a portion of the Climate Change Action Line of Credit, the institutions have agreed to make €30 million (US$36 million) available in concessional financing to CDB’s 19 borrowing member states.

The financing will strengthen the public health systems that are dealing with the pandemic and will go towards improving capacity for testing, tracing and treatment, logistics, storage, transport and monitoring activities, the purchase of vaccines and the execution of vaccination campaigns.

During a virtual signing ceremony, CDB President Dr Gene Leon and Vice President of the EIB Ricardo Mourinho Félix stressed the importance of vaccination and improvements in regional health systems to aid in economic recovery.

Pointing to the widespread effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on regional economies, Leon indicated that the uptake of at least one dose of COVID vaccine in the region ranges from 5.5 per cent in Jamaica to 71.4 per cent in the Cayman Islands.

“This less than stellar performance is rooted in vaccine supply issues, costs and vaccine hesitancy in our countries,” said Leon.

He said that as tourism-dependent economies welcomed visitors back to their shores, those tourists wanted to have a sense of comfort “that when they enter our space to receive a service, they are receiving a service in an environment that is equally safe”.

“So, we don’t only want them to come in fully vaccinated. We equally want our countries’ people to be fully vaccinated that we have this exchange among vaccinated people . . . . So it is in everyone’s interest to get vaccinated and to get past that minimum 70 per cent threshold [herd immunity]. We need to go beyond 70 per cent to talk about being safe across the country,” the CDB president said.

Leon said strong partnerships and collaboration were essential for addressing the pandemic and other issues.

“Unless brought under control, the pandemic could undermine hard-earned development gains and stymie efforts to achieve the sustainable development goals. Vaccination of the populations to achieve herd immunity is crucial if the risk of infection is to be reduced, and [with] lives saved, economies rebuild safely,” he said.

“However, limited fiscal space, further undermined by the impacts of the pandemic, is challenging the capacity of countries to procure vaccines and to attend to the critical needs of the health sector.”

Félix said the EIB partnership with the CDB would help protect vulnerable groups against the impact of the pandemic.

“By spreading the cost of vaccinating the population over time, and by providing new funding for health sector interventions, the CDB-EIB partnership will help Caribbean countries protect vulnerable groups against the impact of the pandemic to reduce the spread of the virus and make sure that Caribbean economies can welcome back tourists and make the region a destination of choice, even while the pandemic still affects us,” he said.

Félix added that the concessional financing was designed to help lighten the financial burden on already struggling Caribbean economies.

The CDB President noted that there was no cap on the amount of funds countries wanted to borrow from the available €30 million (US$36 million).

Adding that the money would be disbursed on a first-come, first-serve basis, Leon said he was hoping to commit those funds by the end of this year.

Leon and Félix agreed that should there be need for more funds, it could be made available from the Climate Change Action Line of Credit through additional repurposing.

The Climate Change Action Line of Credit was established in 2017 to the tune of €120 million (US$144 million) to help borrowing member countries address climate change.
(MM)