27 May 2021
Covid and Sovereignty
Big Power Compulsion
By John Watson
The stories from India are heartrending. It isn’t so much the numbers – if you believe the official death figures they are lower in proportion to the population than ours – it is the sheer hopelessness, people watching family members die when the infrastructure of care has collapsed, calls for help which are not even acknowledged by the overwhelmed medical services, and now the spread of mucormycosis, the black fungus to which Covid survivors there are vulnerable, bringing a second brush with death and often the loss of eyesight. And what we are seeing is probably just the tip of an iceberg. India is a relatively sophisticated country, with many internet savvy citizens. God knows what is going on in some of the darker corners of the earth.
It is easy when looking at the way in which Covid is affecting different communities to focus on the past. If only they had imposed social distancing earlier. If only they had more ventilators or more doses of vaccine. If only they had prioritised the threat of infection over letting life continue as normal. Yes, brainstorming is human and we all love to point out that others, or indeed we ourselves, should have been more circumspect. At the moment, however, that is entirely beside the point. The question is what is to be done now.
In an article in Saturday’s “Financial Times” Gordon Brown, our last Labour Prime Minister, stressed that no one is safe until the pandemic is properly contained globally. Yes, for a time those vaccinated are unlikely to die of the disease and, as it now appears, less likely to pass it on, but as a long term defence that is both imperfect and fragile. Imperfect because it means that even those vaccinated will have to take continuous boosters. Fragile because the virus mutates and while it is out of control in any part of the world there is a risk of a mutation which will break through the vaccine walls elsewhere. Vaccination is therefore needed on a global scale not just because that is ethically desirable – although of course it is – but because it is in absolutely everybody’s interest.
As always, the line from what is necessary to what is delivered is a torturous one. There are many different interests in play. Those countries which have secured enough vaccine for their own population are understandably reluctant to risk their stockpile dropping below what they may need. Take the UK for example. We have large amounts of vaccine because we invested big sums of public money in its development on the basis that we would have first dibs. How would the public feel if we now gave away a proportion of our stock as result of which we were hit by a virulent third wave? It isn’t doable politically and yet one cannot compare our gradual emergence from lockdown with the suffering in India without feeling a little uncomfortable.
Then the obstruction to the vaccination programme isn’t just at the supply end. Recipient countries do not always use the vaccine available to them and sometimes one suspects that is for reasons of politics, albeit dressed up as science. Was the reluctance of the EU to accept the Astra Zeneca vaccine initially in any way linked to resentments over Brexit? Probably it was.
As long as the response to pandemics of this sort remain in the hands of individual countries, global vaccination programs are always bound to be fragmented. Home population first will always be the general rule. Then perhaps it will be friendly countries second, or perhaps countries where the donor wishes to establish influence or who have something to give in return. The reaction needs to be much more internationally coordinated than that.
This was recognised by the World Health Organisation, the EU, the President of France and the Gates foundation by the launch of the ACT Accelerator last year with the aim of supporting the development and distribution of tests, treatments and vaccines throughout the world. Many countries (including Britain) and other organisations have made contributions and eventually it is to be hoped that sufficient money will be raised to complete a trans-global programme.
This is a useful and sensible initiative but as a blueprint for future emergencies it is not quite enough. Firstly, in the case of pandemics, throwing money at solutions may help to satisfy demand but cannot stop the spread of disease in jurisdictions which are not prepared to accept that action is needed. It is not so long ago that we had a president of United States sceptical about Covid vaccination. There must be many countries in the world which take a similar line or will do so on another occasion. That leaves places for viruses to mutate. What is really needed is an organisation which can both distribute medicines but also insist on their being used.
The second drawback is that health is only one of the emergencies which face us at the moment. The other obvious one is climate change although one should not forget the potential for serious nuclear disaster. In these areas too we need a global response to threats and that response must include both funding and an element of restriction and discipline.
The idea of rich and powerful countries imposing any sort of discipline on developing countires is deeply unfashionable at the moment. It carries the taint of colonialism, not to mention the assumption of a rather smug technical and moral superiority. And yet in the last analysis an element of universal discipline is going to be necessary if we are really to make it to the end of the century and the only people who can impose it are the big powers. It is hard to imagine the US, China and Russia working together on anything at the moment but they must all be reflecting that they need to do so in the area of global catastrophe management. Would that be a breach of other countries’ sovereignty? Of course it would. But if we want to leave something to our children we will just have to put up with that.
tile photo: Govind Krishnan on Unsplash
