When the hidden enemy targets all indiscriminately, we need a collective approach. Business consultant Dr Axel Kravatzky talks about why Covax might still be the best idea against covid19.
When UN Secretary-General António Guterres confirmed that more than 82 per cent of the world's vaccine doses had gone to affluent countries, he restated an earlier assertion that “no one will be safe until everyone is safe” – a reminder of just how interconnected human wellbeing is.
We are far from the breakthrough needed, having shipped only 90 million doses through the Covax facility to 133 countries and 42 million doses donated.
By the end of 2021, the Covax facility, the largest vaccine procurement and supply operation, is expected to have two billion doses ready for delivery in 190 countries. The overall vaccine production capacity is expected to rise sharply from approximately 13.5 billion in 2021 to about 43.5 billion doses in 2022.
The Covax facility, a broad partnership, was developed under the leadership of Gavi, a public-private alliance, with core partners the WHO, UNICEF, the World Bank, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
This experience has shown that such collaborations require a lot of work and complex governance to agree on solutions and even then, co-operation is not always very stable. Covax was indeed developed on an all-for-one-and-one-for-all approach for defeating the pandemic; it relied on all countries, including the higher-income countries, purchasing significant amounts of vaccines through the facility. In unity, there is strength.
The generally agreed target was that Covax would provide sufficient vaccines for 20 per cent of the population in lower-income countries. That is far from the widely used estimate of at least 70 per cent population immunisation, the requirement to achieve herd immunity.
But even the 20 per cent were put at risk. Three dozen countries bypassed the facility and made huge bilateral deals with the manufacturers – thereby literally clearing the shelves. By August 2020, the US had entered into seven bilateral deals with six companies for 800 million doses, enough to vaccinate 140 per cent of its population.
Not much later, the EU followed with two deals for 500 million doses, and the UK had entered into five deals, securing 270 million doses, enough for 225 per cent of the UK population.
Fighting a pandemic can only be overcome by collective, integrated efforts. Isn't it time for rich and poor, private and public, to innovate further and find robust ways of working together to better all? Because until we find more ways to bring equitable support to deal with pandemics and other global threats, we fight a losing battle.
The solution is to ensure that all organisations, including corporations, put their true purpose at their core. Purpose-driven organisations act differently, since they focus on the ultimate wellbeing, the health and welfare of the planet and its people. Yet they remain astoundingly profitable.
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