Covid-19: Vaccinations and Global Public Health

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, said, the development of Covid-19 vaccinations has been an incredible scientific achievement that has surpassed almost all expectations of what could be achieved so soon. However, as my noble friend Lord Boateng highlighted in his excellent introduction to this debate, the distribution of vaccinations which has left most of the world without access has been a huge geopolitical failure.

Last month, the Associated Press reported scenes in Kampala of nurses desperate to avert violence as people in Uganda’s capital jostled for the few vaccines that had arrived in the country. The same scenes are being repeated across the global south, where the hopelessness that the UK experienced in 2020 as the virus spread through the country without there being any protection is still playing out.

As Gordon Brown has said, this is in part a result of vaccine nationalism. More than 80% of vaccinations worldwide have ended up in G20 countries and, as a result of over-ordering with no focus on redistribution, around only 2% of people in Africa have been vaccinated. The tragedy is that this hoarding of vaccine will benefit no one. Regardless of how well vaccinated we are in the western world, as all noble Lords have repeated in this debate, if the virus continues to circulate and mutate elsewhere in the world it will remain a threat to us all. The problem also lies with the lack of political leadership and the Government’s unwillingness to step into a vacuum and make a stand. I have no doubt that the Minister will repeat the details of what the UK has done—we have heard it in the debate—in terms of financial contributions, Gavi, the COVAX Facility and CEPI. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, said, we should absolutely have been a champion in the world in terms of global vaccination, driving the issue throughout to deal with the suffering that will otherwise continue in the global south. I repeat that we must be aware that if we do not, the virus will continue to pose a danger.

What did the Government do? What have we seen? The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, set out exactly some of the horrible contradictions which I hope the Minister will respond to. What did we do? It took almost six months for the Government to begin donating the promised surplus doses of vaccines to low-income countries, and there has been no effort to speed up the process. Ahead of the G7 summit, Labour called for a serious commitment to vaccinate the world, but leaders at it managed to pledge only 9% of the 11 billion doses the world needs. What is required is a credible plan, backed by the necessary resources from the world’s wealthiest countries, as my noble friends have said in this debate. Labour laid out a 10-point plan which we put to the Government. We wrote to government Ministers. It is a strategy which could help transform global vaccine production to produce and distribute enough coronavirus vaccines for the whole world. It included proposals to build on the audit work already undertaken by CEPI, launch a global procurement programme for essential supplies and agree a comprehensive plan to transfer the expertise, knowledge and skills required to start vaccine production at new facilities around the world. This is the exact ambition we need from the Government to overcome the shortage in the global south.

We also need to see that the Government are alert to the ongoing blockages which are preventing distribution and manufacture in the global south. In sub-Saharan Africa in particular, limited manufacturing capacity has meant that it is especially vulnerable to supply-chain disturbances, and we must be alert to these disturbances and be in constant dialogue with the political leaders in the global south so that we can address and overcome these obstacles.

In addition, we need to look at the long term, accept that Covid is likely to stay and plan for future vaccination cycles. This means building up strong and resilient healthcare systems. The noble Lords, Lord Purvis and Lord Oates, highlighted that, instead of building up those systems, we have cut—cut support to those incredibly vulnerable countries and undermined those health systems. I have spoken a lot in this Chamber about the cuts to the nutrition programme, the foundation blocks to make vaccines effective, by 80%. Women and children are suffering. I hope, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, has asked, that the Minister will respond that those cuts will be restored, as soon as possible.

The pandemic is not over. For much of the global south, the worst may not yet have passed. It is in everyone’s interest that we address the blockages and disruptions that are preventing the delivery of vaccinations to low-income nations, but we must accept that there are systematic political issues behind those shortages, too.

We are fortunate. The UK is in a fortunate position to have access to sufficient vaccines for our entire adult population, but the most effective way to protect our population is to pass on any surplus doses remaining, not taking it down from the COVAX facility, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, which should be redistributing. I hope again that the Minister responds positively to the questions of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis.

I conclude with the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Sugg: addressing the shortage of vaccinations in the global South is not only the morally right thing to do—it is in our self-interest to do it. It is in our country’s self-interest and the people of this country’s self-interest. It is the only course of action that will protect us from this virus again causing the destruction and suffering we have seen in the past 18 months. I look forward to the Minister’s response.