Residents of more than 130 countries around the world have not received the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, UNESCO Director General Audre Azoulay said, TASS reports.
“When the vaccination campaigns were announced, the world breathed a sigh of relief. Without solidarity, we are far from achieving this goal, (…) and the most vulnerable [states] are currently not protected, ”she explained. While developed countries have provided their populations with ample supplies of vaccines, developing countries are far behind. According to Ozule, in the current state of affairs, residents of many developing countries will not have access to drugs until 2022.
Also, the UNESCO International Bioethics Committee (IBC) and the World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology (COMEST) have called for a change in the vaccination strategy against coronavirus, calling for vaccines to be viewed as a global public good. This will ensure that the drug is available equitably in all countries. In doing so, pharmaceutical companies have a special responsibility to finance businesses that can produce vaccines with maximum efficiency and ensure their rapid distribution.
Earlier, the organization for the fight against poverty and preventable diseases ONE Campaign caught rich countries in the purchase of an excess amount of the drug against COVID-19. Thus, the United States, the European Union, Great Britain, Australia, Canada and Japan together received more than 3 billion doses – while for the introduction of two doses of the drug to all citizens, just over 2 billion are needed.
In January, UN Secretary-General António Guterres accused rich countries of “vaccine nationalism.” According to him, in the struggle to purchase vaccines, such states ignored the needs of less developed countries.
As of February 24, there are more than 112 million people infected with coronavirus in 192 states in the world, of which 2.49 million have died, 63 million have recovered. Most of the infected are registered in the USA, India, Brazil, Great Britain and Russia.
