The covid has defeated the world. One year after the WHO will decree the global alert, more than 101 million cases and more than 2.2 million deaths are sufficient proof of this failure.
All the mistakes made to contain the pandemic can be grouped into two large blocks: the individualism of nations in the face of a global problem and the politicization of the pandemic.
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Until the appearance of Covid-19, pandemics were treated from a strictly scientific perspective. However, Trump’s accusations against China, the country where the virus originated, as well as the contempt for scientists shown by Trump himself and many other populist leaders, succeeded in imposing politics on science.
There has been hardly any cooperation between countries. Nationalist individualism has prevented the implementation of a global strategy. The states fought for medical supplies at the beginning of the pandemic just as they fight for vaccines now.
Tedros A. Ghebreyesus, director of the WHO, warns that “the world is on the verge of moral failure.”
Of the more than 68 million vaccines administered, none have been delivered in low- and middle-income countries. None in Africa, for example.
Rich countries have signed priority deals with pharmaceutical companies, increasing an inequality that the climate crisis and wars had already exacerbated.
The EU controversy with AstraZeneca is one example. By prohibiting the export of vaccines to countries such as the United Kingdom, the United States or Canada to prioritize the care of European citizens, Brussels breaks the principle of solidarity.
The WHO has been able to do little in the face of the preeminence of politics and nationalisms. It has been condescending to China, unable to impose the necessary protocols to tackle the pandemic.
Covax, WHO’s initiative to distribute 1 billion vaccines equitably this year, especially among poor countries, is the world’s last chance to regain the morality lost during the pandemic.
Covax’s success will depend on states understanding something the WHO repeats from day one: No one will be safe until we all are.
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