China’s vaccine diplomacy sweeps the globe
TAIPEI, Taiwan — The plane laden with vaccines had just rolled to a stop at Santiago’s airport in late January, and Chile’s president, Sebastian Pinera, was beaming.
“Today,” he said, “is a day of joy, emotion and hope.”
The source of that hope: China — a country Chile and dozens of other nations are depending on to help rescue them from the COVID-19 pandemic.
China’s vaccine diplomacy campaign has been a surprising success: It has pledged roughly 500 million doses of its vaccine to more than 45 countries, according to a country-by-country tally by Associated Press. With just four of China’s many vaccine makers able to produce at least 2.6 billion doses this year, a large part of the world’s population will end up inoculated not with the fancy Western vaccines boasting headline-grabbing efficacy rates, but with China’s humble, traditionally made shots.
Amid a dearth of public data on China’s vaccines, fears over their efficacy and safety are still pervasive in the countries depending on them, along with concerns about what China might want in return for deliveries. Nonetheless, inoculations with Chinese vaccines have begun in more than 25 countries, and the shots have been delivered to another 11, according to AP’s tally, based on independent reporting in those countries along with government and company announcements.
It’s a potential face-saving coup for China, which has been determined to transform itself from an object of mistrust over its initial mishandling of the COVID19 outbreak to a savior.
“We’re seeing certainly real-time vaccine diplomacy start to play out, with
China in the lead in terms of being able to manufacture vaccines within China and make them available to others,” said Krishna Udayakumar, founding director of the Duke Global Health Innovation Center at Duke University.
China has said it is supplying “vaccine aid” to 53 countries and exports to 27, but it rejected a request by the AP for the list. Beijing has denied vaccine diplomacy, and a Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson said China considered the vaccine a “global public good.” Chinese experts reject any connection between the export of its vaccines and the revamping of its image.
China has targeted the low- and middle-income countries largely left behind as rich nations scooped up most of the pricey vaccines
produced by the likes of Pfizer and Moderna. And despite a few delays of its own, China has largely capitalized on slower-thanhoped-for deliveries by U.S. and European vaccine makers.
Like many other countries, Chile received far fewer doses of the Pfizer vaccine than first promised. Chinese company Sinovac acted quickly, sending in 4 million doses.
The choices are limited for Chile and many other low- and middle-income countries. Vaccine deployment globally has been dominated by rich nations, which have snapped up 5.4 billion of the 7.8 billion doses purchased worldwide, according to Duke University.
China’s vaccines, which can be stored in standard refrigerators, are attractive
to many countries that may struggle to accommodate the ultracold storage needs of vaccines like Pfizer’s.
Sinovac and Sinopharm rely on a traditional technology in which a live virus is killed and then purified, triggering an immune response. Some countries view it as safer than the newer, less-proven technology used by some Western competitors that targets the coronavirus’s spike protein, despite the lack of publicly available safety data on the Chinese vaccines.
In Europe, China is providing the vaccine to countries such as Serbia and Hungary — a significant geopolitical victory in Central Europe and the Balkans, where the West, China and Russia are competing for political and economic influence. Hungary is the first EU
country to use a Chinese vaccine.
But China’s vaccine diplomacy will be only as good as the vaccines it is offering, and it still faces hurdles.
“The Chinese vaccine, in particular, there was insufficient data available compared to other vaccines,” said Ahmed Hamdan Zayed, a nurse in Egypt who overcame his initial reluctance and got Sinopharm’s vaccine.
Sinopharm, which said its vaccine was 79% effective based on interim data from clinical trials, did not respond to interview requests.
Chinese vaccine companies have been “slow and spotty” in releasing their trial data, compared with companies like Pfizer and Moderna, said Yanzhong Huang, a global health expert at the U.S. think tank Council for Foreign Relations. None of China’s three vaccine candidates used globally have publicly released their late-stage clinical trial data. CanSino, another Chinese company with a one-shot vaccine that it says is 65% effective, declined to be interviewed.
There is also confusion around Sinovac’s efficacy. In Turkey, where Sinovac conducted part of its efficacy trials, officials have said the vaccine was 91% effective. However, in Brazil, officials revised the efficacy rate in late-stage clinical trials from 78% to just over 50% after including mild infections.
An expert panel in Hong Kong published data submitted by Sinovac to health regulators that showed the vaccine was just over 50% effective.
Globally, public health officials have said any vaccine that is at least 50% effective is useful.
Receiving countries are also worried that China’s vaccine diplomacy may come at a cost. In the Philippines, where Beijing is donating 600,000 vaccines, a senior diplomat said China Foreign Minister Wang Yi gave a subtle message to tone down public criticism of growing Chinese assertiveness in the disputed South China Sea.
The senior diplomat said Wang didn’t ask for anything in exchange for vaccines, but it was clear he wanted “friendly exchanges in public, like control your megaphone diplomacy a little.” The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the issue publicly.
Still, the pandemic’s urgency has largely superseded hesitations over China’s vaccines.
“Vaccines, particularly those made in the West, are reserved for rich countries,” said one Egyptian official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the matter. “We had to guarantee a vaccine. Any vaccine.”
Today marks the 50th anniversary of perhaps the greatest sporting event of my lifetime, and one of the most significant of the 20th century: the so-named “Fight of the Century” between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier on March 8, 1971, at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
Both boxers were undefeated, with a combined record of 57-0 (Ali, 31; Frazier,
26), with 48 knockouts (Ali, 25; Frazier. 23). Each fighter was guaranteed $2.5 million ($16 million today). The similarities of each man’s boxing record belied the differences between them, and how each was perceived in American society.
Muhammad Ali, born Cassius Clay in Louisville, Kentucky, won a surprise victory over Sonny Liston, the reigning heavyweight champion in 1964. Afterward, Clay announced his membership in the Nation of Islam and took the name Muhammad Ali. Defending his boxing crown (and with the Vietnam War escalating), Ali was reclassified by the U.S. government to eligible draft status, and in April 1967, refused induction based on his religion. He was stripped of his heavyweight crown and banned from boxing; Ali appealed the draft evasion conviction and spent the prime years of his career out of boxing (the Supreme Court would rule in favor of Ali in June 1971, stating that the government failed to specify why his objection was denied).
Joe Frazier, born on a farm in South Carolina, moved to Philadelphia as a teen and took up boxing. After turning professional, and rising in the heavyweight division, Frazier, after Ali’s banishment, defeated Buster Mathis and Jimmy Ellis to gain the undisputed crown going into the Garden match.
The Ali/Frazier fight was more than about two legendary boxers. It was a culture clash, fought in the shadow of Vietnam and anti-war movement, as well as the civil rights movement, with Americans choosing between more than two boxers; but between two concepts of America: Ali, refusing draft induction; a proud Black man who changed his name and embraced a religious group perceived as hostile to whites. Frazier, whose life mirrored many African Americans born in the deep South, was apolitical, did not evade the draft, did not belong to the NOI, nor engaged in braggadocio; thus to many white Americans, he was everything Ali was not.
That was the case in my family, as especially the draft issue, made them opposed to Ali. I was an 8th grader in middle school, and the talk in class and at lunch centered on the fight in the days leading up to March 8, and my sympathies — reflecting my family — were also with Frazier.
Madison Square Garden, all 20,455 seats filled, became the center of the sports world. Ringside seats cost $150 ($968 in
2021 dollars). An overflow crowd of 6,500 watched closed circuit at Radio City Music Hall. An estimated 300 million people worldwide watched the fight. Celebrities were everywhere: Woody Allen, Sammy Davis Jr., Bing Crosby (at Radio City), and Frank Sinatra (unable to get a ringside seat, he was hired as photographer by Life magazine). Former heavyweight champions Jack Dempsey and Joe Louis were there. Howard Cosell, Ali’s foil in TV interviews (but strong supporter), was not on the telecast, but was in attendance.
While most sporting events rarely equal their hype beforehand, the “Fight of the
Century,” more than lived up to expectations, as the fight went the full 15 rounds.
Ali seemed ahead in the early rounds; but by Round 6 and later, Frazier began taking advantage of his strong left hook, which hit Ali’s jaw on more than one occasion. In the final round, Frazier uncorked a left hook, sending Ali to the canvas. The three judges, including referee Arthur Mercante Sr., awarded a unanimous decision to Frazier, who retained the heavyweight crown and handed Ali his first professional boxing defeat.
Ali and Frazier fought twice more (including the brutal “Thrilla in Manila”). Frazier lost his title in 1973; Ali won back the heavyweight belt the following year and regained it a third time in 1978. By the mid-1980s, both men were retired from boxing. Frazier died in 2011 and Ali in 2016, having never fully reconciled from the often bitter confrontations surrounding their epic bouts.
My respect for Joe Frazier endured. But as the years passed, my view of Muhammad Ali changed, as I came to respect his decision to refuse induction and, as a historian, his larger-than-life impact on American sports and society in the 20th century.
Boxing today, as in times past, is rife with corruption and bad characters, and the sport has declined in popularity, with many urging its abolishment. Regardless, there will likely never be another boxing match, possibly even another singular sporting event (including a Super Bowl or World Cup) that transfixed America and the world as the “Fight of the Century” did half a century ago today.