Health professionals will administer the COVID-19 vaccine to residents of the Jackson Heights Ward of St. Johns Missionary Baptist Church on January 10, 2021 in Tampa, Florida.
Octavio Jones | Getty Images
LONDON – The head of the World Health Organization said on Monday that the equitable distribution of coronavirus vaccines “is at serious risk.”
Warning of a “catastrophic moral failure,” said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, “the recent emergence of rapidly spreading variants makes the rapid and equitable deployment of vaccines all the more important.”
But he added that this division could easily become “another stone in the wall for the inequality between the haves and have-nots of the world.”
“With the first vaccines being deployed, the promise of fair access is in serious jeopardy,” he said at a session of the WHO’s board of directors.
While more than 39 million doses of different vaccines have now been administered in at least 49 higher-income countries, he said, only 25 doses had been given in one country with the lowest incomes, he said.
“I have to be blunt, the world is on the brink of catastrophic moral failure and the price of this failure will be paid by living and livelihoods in the world’s poorest countries.”
At the outset of his speech, Tedros had emphasized that the development and approval of safe coronavirus vaccines less than a year after the emergence of the virus in China in late 2019 was “an astonishing achievement and a much-needed source of hope.”
However, he added that “it is not correct that younger, healthier adults in rich countries are more likely to be vaccinated than health workers and older people in poorer countries.”
“There will be enough vaccine for everyone, but right now we need to work together as one global family to give priority to (those) most at risk of serious illness and death in all countries.”
Without naming names, Tedros said some countries and companies speak the language of fair access but continue to prioritize bilateral deals, bypassing COVAX, driving prices up and trying to jump to the fore. “This is not correct,” he said.
COVAX is a global program co-led by an international vaccine alliance called Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and also WHO. It was created to ensure fair access to vaccines for every country in the world. It aims to deliver 2 billion doses of safe, effective vaccines that have been approved by regulatory authorities and / or WHO prequalification by the end of 2021.
The WHO called on richer countries that had pre-ordered millions of doses of coronavirus vaccines, such as the US, UK and Europe, to share some of those vaccines with COVAX so that it can then redistribute them to poorer countries.
Richer countries have been accused of “hoarding” more vaccines than they need, although the supply of vaccines is still in its infancy, as mass inoculations – which began in the West in December – are mostly still in their early stage of distribution.
Tedros called on countries that have bilateral agreements with vaccine manufacturers and on pre-delivery controls, to “be transparent with COVAX on volumes, prices and delivery dates” and to share their own doses with COVAX once they vaccinate their own health workers and parent . populations.