WHO: Poor people can be “trampled” in the stampede of vaccines

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus confirmed that the covid-19 vaccine should be a public good.

The World Health Organization (WHO) warned this Friday, December 4 that the poor run the risk of being “trampled” in the stampede of rich countries by a vaccine against covid-19, and said these should be good. public.

At a UN virtual summit on the coronavirus pandemic, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the world is seeing “the light at the end of the tunnel” in the COVID crisis that has been going on for nearly a year.

But let me be clear. We simply cannot accept a world in which the poor and the marginalized are trampled by the rich and powerful in the stampede of the vaccine, ”Tedros said.

“This is a global crisis and solutions need to be shared equally as global public goods. Not as private commodities that widen inequalities and become one more reason some people are left behind, “he said.

He also warned that the world has many other challenges. “There is no vaccine against poverty, there is no vaccine against hunger. There is no vaccine against inequality. There is no vaccine against climate change, ”he listed.

Britain became the first Western nation to approve a vaccine for COVID-19, and the United States and other countries are expected to follow through with massive vaccination campaigns soon.

WHO created the Covax platform to ensure fair distribution of the vaccine around the world.

The United States resist and are not part of it. President Donald Trump has attacked Tedros and announced that the country will leave WHO, although President-elect Joe Biden has already said that it will not.

Tedros, an Ethiopian doctor and diplomat, praised the countries for providing free vaccines, tests and treatments for COVID-19, but wondered why there are no similar efforts with other already existing diseases such as cancer, tuberculosis or HIV / AIDS. , or for needs such as maternal care.

“The pandemic only underscored why universal health coverage is so important,” he said.