‘In the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccine nationalism has become an important and controversial phenomenon. Rather than cooperate through global mechanisms to develop, manufacture, and distribute a vaccine against the coronavirus, countries with the means to do so have prioritized national access to a vaccine. Despite warnings about its adverse consequences for global health and international cooperation, vaccine nationalism is not abating. The political momentum of vaccine nationalism can be found in not only the pharmaceutical realm but also cyberspace.
‘A New York Times story from September 5 detailed how the race to develop a coronavirus vaccine has produced a proliferation of cyber espionage targeting vaccine research and development. According to the article, the pandemic triggered a shift “for the world’s intelligence agencies, pitting them against each other in a new grand game of spy versus spy” such that “every major spy service around the globe is trying to find out what everyone else is up to.”
Read here (Council on Foreign Relations, Sept 14, 2020)
