Omicron, the new COVID-19 variant, is now on the rise. While southern Africa appears to be its epicenter, countries like the UK, Canada, Australia, Israel, and others are now reporting cases. Dr. Anthony Fauci calls it “inevitable” that it will come to the US or that it is already in the US. We know the variant is very contagious, but we still don’t know how severe it is or how resistant to vaccines it will be.
We know about Omicron because South African scientists discovered it early and their government notified the world immediately. Unfortunately, South Africa is now being punished rather than rewarded, with the US being the leading countries in imposing travel restrictions on South Africa and other African countries without offering economic aid to offset the losses imposed.
These travel bans are politically popular, but medically ineffective. We saw that with the original COVID-19 outbreak. Former President Donald Trump restricted entry from China, but the ban did not apply to American citizens and did not involve large-scale testing at the border or across the country. The virus had already escaped China and European travelers brought it to the US. The ban is a wall, but a wall cannot stop an airborne disease.
President Joe Biden’s ban also promises to be ineffective. It’s also not associated with aggressive testing and tracking. Omicron is already spreading in countries with no travel restrictions. This, as one author pointed out, is pandemic theater, not public health.
Only about 10% of the population of Africa are vaccinated. You don’t need a travel ban. They must be traveled with medical and public health infrastructure. We have to vaccinate them, not ban them.
This abuse is both unjust and foolish. Poorer countries in Africa have the greatest health needs, yet have the least access to vaccines, tests and treatments.
We cannot ignore them. The modern globe is tightly interconnected, and pandemics are spreading before they are sufficiently noticed to trigger a public response. To counter a global pandemic, the entire globe must be mobilized. When countries are ignored or left out, they can become incubators of new varieties that are conquering the world. The threat is global; the answer must be global.
However, as the international director of the World Health Organization noted in February, 2.5 billion people in the world’s 130 poor countries have not been vaccinated. There will be no mass vaccination in the 85 poorest countries before 2023. As he noted, “the humanitarian costs are unforgivable – and self-destructive as each infected person is a potential source of new strains.”
Repeated promises to provide vaccines have been broken. Neither the vaccines nor the resources to deliver them were provided. Pharmaceutical companies, making massive profits from vaccines, largely publicly developed, have struggled to maintain their monopolies and resist efforts to make vaccine production available worldwide.
South Africa has suffered this treatment before in connection with the treatment of AIDS. The pharmaceutical companies protected by rich nations refused to have cheaper generic versions manufactured and sold. They even sued the Nelson Mandela government for allowing generic drugs to be imported. Only overwhelming global outrage forced the drug companies to postpone the lawsuit and close a deal.
This week, more than 2 million nurses from 28 countries called on the United Nations to investigate rich countries – including the European Union, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Singapore and Norway – that have blocked coronavirus vaccine patent waivers. Reasonably, Joe Biden has put the US on the side of surrender.
Failure by pharmaceutical companies and governments to ensure that “critical treatments and vaccines are distributed fairly,” criticized the nurses’ statement that this is not only unfair but also dangerous. A meeting of the Council on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights of the World Trade Organization has been postponed because of the ongoing disagreement over the widespread availability of vaccines.
Nobody is safe until everyone is safe. Life in Africa is as precious as the life of those who live in rich countries. In the modern world, borders cannot be sealed off and walls will not stop the spread of pandemics. Dr. Martin Luther King taught us: “Whatever affects you directly affects everyone indirectly.”
We need to rethink our real security priorities. Rather than wasting hundreds of billions on a new arms race with China, let us join China and the world’s rich nations to build the public health capacities needed around the world, while mobilizing to make vaccines, treatments, masks and other protective measures universally available . Instead of having drugs rationed by price, as we did with private companies in World War II, we should oblige them to share vaccines and build production capacities.
We don’t yet know what threat Omicron poses. We know the COVID-19 pandemic is not over yet; that death is still on the rise and that new varieties will sprout in areas where humans are not protected. Rather than banning travel from Africa, President Biden should shed the light on Africa and guide contact efforts.
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