Anthony Fauci informed the World Health Organization on Thursday that the Biden government will participate in the WTO’s vaccine sharing project. This reverses President Donald Trump’s America First approach. Fauci says the goal is to ensure “fair access” to vaccines for all countries in the world, rich and poor.
Americans who scramble to be vaccinated have the right to know how sharing doses with poor countries will affect their own ability to be vaccinated.
President Biden is under pressure from the public health community to share the vaccine supply that the United States has purchased in advance, even before all Americans want to receive it.
The vaccine sharing project, abbreviated COVAX, raises money to buy vaccines for poor countries, but also asks rich countries to donate actual doses. The principles of the COVAX part, launched on December 18, are causing controversy in France, England, Canada and other countries struggling to get their own population vaccinated. COVAX wants countries to share their doses as they receive them, rather than waiting to see what’s left. So far, Norway has agreed.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says it is unfair for younger, healthy adults in countries such as the United States to receive injections before frail and elderly people in poor countries. He calls it a “catastrophic moral failure.”
Similarly, Kate Elder of Médecins Sans Frontières objects “when a healthy 20-year-old in New Jersey is vaccinated in front of a leading health worker in South Sudan.”
Bruce Aylward, a WHO adviser, claims that it is unacceptable for a country to vaccinate its entire population before offering doses to the inhabitants of the poorer countries at greatest risk.
Duke University health experts also argue that high-risk groups in poor countries should get the vaccine in front of the American public. A report by the Duke Global Health Innovation Center complains that affluent countries are monopolizing the initial supply.
Thursday’s statement from the White House on the sharing of vaccines says the United States will comply with it as soon as there is ‘sufficient’ supply here. What does ‘sufficient’ mean? When only those with the greatest risk are vaccinated, as globalists suggest, or when shots are offered to all Americans? The public needs a clear answer to the question.
There are strong reasons to oppose the principles of COVAX against the sharing of vaccines.
First, U.S. taxpayers spent billions in Operation Warp Speed to develop the vaccines with the understanding that they would get a large portion of the initial production. When Trump refused to join COVAX, The New York Times described the decision as “vaccine nationalism,” but Americans desperate to be vaccinated are unlikely to worry about political correctness.
Second, the U.S. is aiming to achieve herd immunity by summer, which scientists say should inoculate about 70 percent of the population. Redirecting part of the vaccine to COVAX could jeopardize the purpose.
The International Chamber of Commerce on Monday joined the call for the equitable distribution of vaccines, arguing that aid from poor countries would benefit the economies of rich people. In the long run, this is true, but if a quarter of each country’s population is vaccinated, as COVAX suggests, it will force the United States and other developed countries to give up on returning to normal this year.
Third, as new virus variants emerge, vaccination becomes even more of a race against the clock. Otherwise, a variant may appear that does not respond to the vaccine. Moderna announced on Monday that its vaccine is slightly less effective against the newly identified South African variant. People may need annual boosters against emerging strains.
In the past two weeks, both the European Union and the United States have been hit with unexpected news about setbacks in manufacturing. On Monday, the European Union actually threatened to ban AstraZeneca from carrying out any doses until it complied with its contractual obligations. The EU puts its own people first.
This is a lesson for America. Decisions on vaccine sharing should not be left to public health ‘experts’ whose globalist views are now emerging in Washington, DC. Helping the world is important, but America must first look after its own.
Betsy McCaughey is the author of ‘The Next Pandemic’.