How Covid-19 vaccines are being weaponised as countries jostle for influence

‘A new hybrid Cold War is underway, with US, China and pivotal states engaging in a power play, says NUS Business School’s Alex Capri...

‘[V]accine diplomacy has shed light on an even more fundamental truth: A hybrid cold war is underway, involving the US, China and other pivotal states. Its by-product is hybrid warfare, a mix of diplomatic, economic, cyber and information-related actions, all of which fall below the threshold of armed conflict but are, nonetheless, disruptive to the workings of the international system.

‘There will be no returning to the kind of globalisation the world experienced over the past four decades. Consequently, state and non-state actors must adapt.’

Read here (Channel News Asia, Apr 8, 2021)

Vaccine makers say coronavirus could be stopped around the globe in months rather than years. Here's how

‘[Bangladhesh's] drug makers say they could produce hundreds of millions of doses in a quick timeframe, if only they could secure a vaccine blueprint... Incepta Pharmaceuticals lies on the outskirts of the Bangladesh capital Dhaka, in an industrial neighbourhood. Fitted out with the latest technology from Germany, the company already produces vaccines to fight a wide array of diseases such as hepatitis b, typhoid, the flu, tetanus, measles, meningococcal and rabies.

‘Mr [Abdul] Muktadir [chairman of Incepta Pharmaceuticals] said the company had plenty of capacity to produce more drugs and could manufacture between 600 to 800 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines annually. "If we get the ready-to-fill material or antigen, instead of waiting until 2023, we can make this vaccine available to our entire nation population within two to three months' time," he said.’

Read here (ABC News, Mar 20, 2021)

Europe is lashing out like a wounded animal but its injuries are self-inflicted

‘As if banning the shipment of 250,000 AstraZeneca doses to Australia earlier this month didn’t set a bad enough precedent, the EU went even further on Wednesday by threatening to take over AstraZeneca’s factories and strip the company of its intellectual property rights unless the pharmaceutical giant delivered more doses over the coming months.

‘European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has grounds to be upset: while Pfizer and Moderna have delivered on their first quarter commitments and pledged to deliver a combined 235 million doses in the second, AstraZeneca is dragging the chain. The firm will give the bloc only 100 million doses over the first six months of 2021 when the EU was expecting 270 million...

‘AstraZeneca certainly bears no blame for the week’s other baffling decision by some EU members to suspend the jab over unfounded safety fears.’

Read here (Sydney Morning Herald, Mar 19, 2021)

Covid-19: EU warns UK over vaccine exports

‘Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, has said that if Covid vaccine supplies in Europe do not improve, the EU "will reflect whether exports to countries who have higher vaccination rates than us are still proportionate". Post-Brexit disagreements between the EU and the UK have been heightened by the diplomatic row over the export of the vaccines.

‘The European Council president, Charles Michel, claimed last week that the UK had imposed an "outright ban" on the export of vaccines and their components - there is no ban though, and his claim was dismissed by the government as "completely false". But Mrs von der Leyen says the EU is still waiting for exports from the UK, and it wants reciprocity.’

Read here (BBC, Mar 17, 2021)

Home Ground: Ethical issues in Covid-19 vaccine roll-outs

‘A principled and pragmatic approach to securing and allocating Covid-19 vaccines works best... ‘Every vaccination programme carries with it ethical concerns over, among other things, safety, efficacy and how to distribute and allocate the vaccine when there are limited supplies...

‘A vaccine programme in the middle of a global pandemic is even trickier. On the one hand, speedy access to the vaccine can make the difference between life and death. On the other hand, the vaccines for Covid-19 are new and relatively untested: The world is learning of side effects as millions more get jabbed; and while we know the short-term efficacy, no one knows how long the protection lasts.

‘As Prof Lim said at the webinar, rolling out vaccination in the middle of a public health emergency is like chasing after a moving target. This requires constant monitoring and updating of rules and plans.’

This account also discusses, in the Singapore context: (1) The race to get hold of supplies (2) Who gets jabbed first and why (3) Why giving a choice of vaccine is not a good idea.

Read here (Straits Times, Mar 12, 2021)

Nobel prize economists Joseph Stiglitz and Michael Spence call for vaccine equity and debt relief

‘Nobel Prize-winning economists Joseph Stiglitz and Michael Spence are spearheading calls for urgent action to help poorer countries recover from the economic ravages of the coronavirus pandemic, including measures to advance vaccine equity, debt relief, and bolstering fiscal resources for cash-strapped nations.

‘The proposals were outlined in a new interim report released on Thursday – the one-year anniversary of the global pandemic – by the Institute for New Economic Thinking’s Commission on Global Economic Transformation, co-chaired by Stiglitz and Spence.‘

Read here (Aljazeera, Mar 11, 2021)\

The pandemic and the economic crisis: A global agenda for urgent action

Read full text here (Institute for New Economic Thinking, March, 2021)

The political economy of Covid-19 vaccines

‘Vaccine grabs, the refusal to relax patents to enable mass production, and the use of vaccines for diplomacy run the risk that poorer nations may not be protected against Covid-19 quickly enough. This will prolong the pandemic, even for the richer nations.’

Read here (The India Forum, Mar 5, 2021)

As the world vies for vaccines, Cuba’s making its own

‘Cuba may be on the verge of a coronavirus vaccine breakthrough and not a moment too soon, as deaths and cases spike on the communist-run island.

‘Starting in March, two of the island's four homegrown vaccine candidates will begin their third and final trials, the Cuban government has announced. While other developing countries compete with richer nations for a limited supply of doses, Cuba has gambled everything on producing their own vaccines, as much an exercise in national pride as a response to a public health crisis.’

Read here (CNN, Mar 3, 2021)

Caught in tangled web of vaccine nationalism -- Jomo Kwame Sundaram

‘As known COVID-19 infections exceed 100 million internationally, with more than two million lives lost, rich countries are now quarrelling publicly over access to limited vaccine supplies. With ‘vaccine nationalism’ widespread, multilateral arrangements have not been able to address current challenges well. 

‘Vaccine nationalism has meant that the rich and powerful come first, not only in societies, but also in the world, making a mockery of the ‘No one left behind’ slogan embraced by the international community.  Many developing countries and most of their people will have to wait for access to vaccines while the powerful and better off secure prior access regardless of need or urgency. Vaccine nationalism and the prospect of more profits by not scaling up output to induce scarcity may thus cause more losses of both lives and livelihoods, causing economies to slow further.’

Read here (ksjomo.org, Feb 2, 2021)