Inequitable distribution of vaccines is leading to more deadly and more resistant strains of the coronavirus.
As News Front previously reported, wealthy countries, which account for 14% of the world’s population, have acquired 53% of all effective COVID-19 vaccines. Most of Pfizer’s vaccine will go to wealthy countries. The Moderna vaccine is supplied exclusively to rich countries. At the same time, 9 out of 10 people in poor countries may never get vaccinated at all.
This approach has extremely negative consequences, say experts interviewed in the study by the People’s Vaccine Alliance. Epidemiologists and virologists interviewed warn that vaccine nationalism will make current vaccines ineffective very soon. According to two-thirds of respondents, the world has less than a year to develop new drugs against COVID-19. About 30% of those surveyed believe that current vaccines will lose their effectiveness in 9 months or even earlier.
At the same time, 88% of the interviewed specialists are sure that low rates of vaccination in poor countries only contribute to the emergence of new strains of the virus that are resistant to vaccines.
“New mutations appear every day. Sometimes they find a niche that makes them more resilient than their predecessors. These successful variants can be transmitted more efficiently and potentially evade immune responses to previous strains”, – said Gregg Gonsalves, assistant professor of epidemiology at Yale University.
Today, Western countries have relied on the vaccination of their own population. In the European Union, the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, authorities are blocking the export of vaccines by stockpiling them for internal use. The problem is, notes Max Lawson, chairman of the People’s Vaccine Alliance, that this approach doesn’t make sense from a global perspective.
“But we have a COVAX [Poor Countries Vaccine Program] target that could possibly reach 27% by the end of the year, if we can handle it, it just isn’t enough”, – Lawson warned.