Global Vaccine Inequities Are Dangerous for Everyone
The U.S. needs to do more to get the world vaccinated against Covid-19
I’ve personally received more doses of a Covid-19 vaccine than 130 countries. While most of the world is still waiting for its first vaccine shipment, the United States currently administers 1.7 million doses per day, a substantial increase from the first weeks of our vaccine rollout when only health care workers like myself were vaccinated. But despite this improvement in speed, the rollout has been plagued by inequities, with populations most impacted by Covid facing the greatest hurdles. The inequities are even more staggering on the global stage.
The stark imbalance between the rapidly expanding rollouts in wealthy countries and the vaccine deserts in low- and middle-income countries is ethically problematic. It also increases the risk of a longer, more painful pandemic in the U.S., regardless of how fast we can vaccinate our population. Just as the U.S. needs to focus on an equitable and robust vaccine rollout domestically, we must help increase production and support the vaccine rollout worldwide.
To be fair, the U.S. isn’t completely absent in the global effort, even as it’s mostly focused on getting vaccines into the arms of Americans. One of the Biden administration’s first…
