UN urges global Covid-19 vaccine plan

Alarm raised on just 10 nations receiving 75% of doses while 130 have had none

NEW YORK: The United Nations led calls for a coordinated global effort to vaccinate against Covid-19, warning that gaping inequities in initial efforts put the whole planet at risk.

Foreign ministers met virtually for a first-ever UN Security Council session on vaccinations called by current chair Britain, which said the world had a “moral duty” to act against the pandemic that has killed more than 2.4 million people.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres voiced alarm that just 10 nations have administered 75% of doses so far – and 130 countries have had none at all.

“The world urgently needs a global vaccination plan to bring together all those with the required power, scientific expertise and production and financial capacities,” Guterres said.

He said the Group of 20 major economies was in the best position to set up a task force on financing and implementation of global vaccinations and offered full support of the United Nations.

“If the virus is allowed to spread like wildfire in the Global South, it will mutate again and again. New variants could become more transmissible, more deadly and, potentially, threaten the effectiveness of current vaccines,” Guterres said.

“This can prolong the pandemic, enabling the virus to come back to plague the Global North.”

Henrietta Fore, head of the UN children’s agency Unicef, said: “The only way out of this pandemic for any of us is to ensure vaccinations are available for all of us.”

Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard denounced the “injustice” of what he called a “deepening gap” as wealthy countries “monopolise the vaccines”.

There is already a plan to help developing nations – Covax is an initiative funded by donors and governments that aims to procure two billion vaccine doses in 2021 with options for a further billion.

Covax will soon be able to start delivery of vaccines after the World Health Organisation approved the shot developed by AstraZeneca, on which the initiative is almost entirely reliant in its first wave.

But aid groups say many people still risk being left out due to a shortfall in Covax funding to arrange the administration and delicate transportation of vaccines.

In his first Security Council appearance, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken vowed President Joe Biden’s administration would take a leadership role after reversing Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the World Health Organisation.

Blinken said the United States would pay up its more than US$200mil (RM807mil) in obligations to the UN body by the end of the month and make a “significant” contribution to Covax.