Vaccine must be for world’s poorest too
Christian Aid calls on the UK and other G20 governments to coordinate a global response to the pandemic.
Christian Aid has called for access to ‘any successful vaccine’ to be shared with the world’s poorest people and not become a ‘global postcode lottery’.
Responding to the news that a Covid-19 vaccine is ninety per cent effective, according to manufacturer Pfizer/BioNTech, the international NGO urged governments to support the global call for a people’s vaccine made at the World Health Assembly in May 2020.
The charity has also called for governments to ensure that access to Covid-19 testing and treatment services are universally free at the point of use.
Patrick Watt, Christian Aid’s director of policy, public affairs and campaigns, said: ‘We are calling on the UK and other G20 governments to coordinate a global response to the pandemic, and agree a recovery plan at the UN.
‘The UK and other G20 countries must support the WHO initiative, made at the World Health Assembly in May, to combine research and create a global patent pool, ensuring that all drugs related to the testing, treatment, prevention and response to Covid-19 are immediately accessible and genuinely affordable to all countries.
‘We noted with disappointment that the proposal to create a global patent pool, which would encourage the production of coronavirus drugs that are affordable for the poorest countries, was opposed at the World Health Assembly in May by the US, UK and Switzerland, perhaps reflecting their status as the homes of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies.’
