Don’t isolate the poor nations
Even though a third wave of covid-19 is right now ripping through most of the countries across the globe, experts have expressed hope that the new variant Omicron may spell an end or turn the pandemic into an endemic.
However, public health officials have also warned that it may be highly unlikely that COVID-19 will be eliminated and say it will continue to kill people, though at much lower levels, even after it becomes an endemic.
The fight against covid-19 can however, be made easier if inequities in vaccinations and medicines are addressed quickly. This has become all the more important as experts believe that covid-19 may never end but because such pandemic viruses end up becoming part of the ecosystem.
Notably, world health body, the WHO has also slammed the imbalance in COVID-19 vaccinations between rich and poor countries as a catastrophic moral failure. Fewer than 10% of people in lower-income countries have received even one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
And if vaccines and other tools aren’t shared fairly, the tragedy of the virus, which has so far killed more than 5.5 million people worldwide, would continue. Right now the focus needs to be on getting to the low levels of disease incidence with maximum vaccination of populations, so nobody has to die due to the viral infections.
Ironically, very little has been done to douse the belief about vaccine hesitancy in African nations as the hesitancy is not so widespread. As of now 80% of Africans were ready to get shots if the vaccines were available.
The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, decried the total collapse of global cooperation and solidarity over the last two years, saying it was totally unacceptable how few people in Africa have gotten vaccine shots. Various sources have claimed that only 10% of Africa’s 1.2 billion people are fully vaccinated.
Even though the situation is not that bad across India, as most of the eligible adults have been vaccinated and even those who have been classified as high risk groups have been identified for the precautionary dose as well.
But since a huge imbalance occurs across the globe vis-à-vis vaccine availability the onus lies on developed and even developing nations to make maximum doses available to the regions where less population has been covered by the vaccine protection.
All this is important because the way the virus has acted suggests that no country can claim an escape or avoidance form the virus as day after day its transmission and infectivity has been achieving new milestones.
The fact is also proven by the presence of various variants including the Omicron which has made its presence felt in a very short period of time.
Vaccine availability and covering poor nations should be the top most priority for the world leaders and they need to come out with a solution soon.
