Canada defends sourcing vaccine from COVAX
OTTAWA — Canada is committed to helping poor countries obtain COVID-19 vaccines, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday as he rebutted criticism over Canada’s decision to draw from an international fund designed to help poor countries.
Oxfam Canada and the ONE Campaign say it is wrong for the federal government to agree to accept almost 1.9 million doses of vaccine from the COVAX Facility by the end of June.
But as Trudeau noted on Friday, Canada is one of the leading donors to COVAX, a new international partnership under the World Health Organization created last year to help deliver billions of expensive vaccine doses to poor countries that can’t afford them.
In return, donor countries are allowed to receive vaccines for their own use.
Canada is facing shortfalls in the delivery of vaccines for Canadians from two major international biotech firms, PfizerBioNTech and Moderna, which has the Trudeau Liberals under fire from their political opponents.
“When wealthier countries invest in COVAX, half of that funding is for doses at home, and the other half is to buy doses for low- and middle-income countries,” Trudeau said Friday.
“Our contribution was always intended to access vaccine doses for Canadians, as well as to support lower income countries.”
Diana Sarosi, Oxfam Canada’s policy director, says it is wrong for Canada to accept COVAX vaccines because of domestic political pressure and says it will ultimately do harm in poorer countries.
“Canada should not be taking the COVAX vaccine from poor nations to alleviate political pressures at home. Receiving one or two million doses isn’t going to solve Canada’s vaccination challenges and it is going to cause harm elsewhere in the world for the poorest and most marginalized people,” Sarosi said in a statement. “Purchasing more vaccines, when Canada has already purchased enough to vaccinate the entire population four times over, is not a viable solution.”
Trudeau said Canada remains committed to helping poor countries, through its commitment to COVAX and other international agreements.
Canada has pledged $220 million to COVAX and another $865 million to the ACT Accelerator, which tries to ensure low- and middle-income countries have equitable access to medical treatments during the pandemic.
“Canada is committed to making sure that the rest of the world doesn’t get left behind when it comes to vaccination. That’s why we are one of the world’s top donors to COVAX,” Trudeau said. “To beat this virus anywhere, we have to beat it everywhere.”