Vaccine 'Apartheid'

Gregg Gonsalves, an epidemiologist at Yale University, in a series of tweets on Wednesday, pointed out.

"More for me. None for you. America first. This is American Covid-19 vaccine policy now," Gonsalves lamented. "It doesn't have to be this way. In a global emergency, you do not hoard resources for yourself, stockpile extra just in case people need a boost, while others die for lack of even one shot, letting variants flourish."

 William Parker and Govind Persad respectively serve as assistant director of the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics and Greenwall Foundation Faculty Scholar in Bioethics, argue that Biden's decision to roll out booster shots for the entire U.S. public as soon as next month is a mistake, particularly as just over 1% of people in low-income nations have received at least one vaccine dose.

"Not only does it risk depriving millions throughout the world of the vaccine, but there also is no evidence that additional shots meaningfully reduce death or hospitalization from Covid-19 for healthy Americans."

To illustrate the massive inoculation gap between rich and poor countries, the pair noted that the 120 million additional mRNA doses the U.S. will likely need for its nationwide booster campaign would be sufficient "to vaccinate the population of Covid-decimated Botswana 26 times over."

"High-income countries have used bilateral contracts with vaccine manufacturers to achieve vaccination rates as much as 50 times that of low-income countries. A campaign for boosters could lock in that apartheid," the pair continued. "This profound global inequity would not only be a humanitarian disaster, but also a significant long-term risk for Americans, as scientists agree that accelerating global vaccination is the only way to prevent the formation of deadly new variants."

According to new research, G7 countries are on track to stockpile nearly a billion extra vaccine doses by the end of 2021. Meanwhile, if current inequities persist, many poor nations may not achieve adequate vaccination rates until 2024 or later.

"Anyone who thinks that vaccinating Americans with a third dose is not going to come at the expense of getting the vaccine to other places in the world—if that's what you think, you're just kidding yourself," Scott Hensley, a vaccines researcher at the University of Pennsylvania's Penn Institute for Immunology, explained.

Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO's regional director for Africa, said during a news conference on Thursday that "moves by some countries globally to introduce booster shots threaten the promise of a brighter tomorrow for Africa," which has fully vaccinated just 2% of its population. "As some richer countries hoard vaccines," said Moeti, "they make a mockery of vaccine equity."

"Feeling sick like a dog and laid up in bed, but not in the hospital with severe Covid, is not a good enough reason for boosters," Dr. Céline Gounder, an infectious disease specialist at Bellevue Hospital Center, told the NYT. "We'll be better protected by vaccinating the unvaccinated here and around the world."

Experts in public health have stressed that the pharmaceutical industry's monopoly control over vaccine production—made possible by an international patent regime that rich countries are choosing to uphold—has artificially constrained global vaccine supply. When supply is limited, rich countries' hoarding of vaccines affects the number of doses available to poor nations.

Experts Warn Rich Nations' Push for Boosters Could Lock in Vaccine 'Apartheid' | Common Dreams News