The World Health Organisation (WHO) has condemned the global failure in vaccine distribution where developed and rich countries are vaccinating children – who are not even at risk – while the poor countries were left begging for lack of COVID-19 vaccine treatment.
“We are failing as a global community,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told media while highlighting Africa’s situation witnessing 40% increase in new infections and deaths in the wake of the COVID-19’s Delta variant spreading globally.
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The WHO chief, who hails from Ethiopia himself, criticized some countries for not sharing the vaccines with low-income countries. He also compared the present COVID-19 situation to the earlier HIV/AIDS crisis – where blame was laid on African nations for being unable to use complicated treatments.
While the present problem was about the supply of vaccines, the difference between the ‘haves’ and the ’have- nots’ totally highlighted the unfairness, injustice, inequality of the world, he added.
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Meanwhile, WHO’s top emergency expert Mike Ryan said that many developing countries are in much better shape — than industrialised countries — for even doing mass vaccination of their populations against infectious diseases from cholera to polio. (AW)
