Global Health Experts Discuss Vaccine Distribution

JEREMY FARRAR, DIRECTOR, WELLCOME TRUST: We have got to do all we can to try and encourage everybody to be vaccinated and provide vaccines around the world in an equitable way. We`re not doing it. We`re not doing it well. The U.K. has done remarkably with the vaccine rollout. And, actually, vaccine hesitancy in the U.K. has historically been very low. But, in France, in Italy, in Spain and in other countries, U.S., vaccine hesitancy, people not wanting to have the vaccine, has been very much higher. I`m personally much more in favor of trying to persuade and communicate and educate and try and persuade people of public health measures. But, sometimes, if that`s not working, I can see why France is taking the idea that you have got to encourage more, you have got to maybe even force people to have the vaccines. But I think your introduction to this section was so important. Most of the world does not have access to vaccines. So it`s not about vaccine hesitancy. It`s about vaccine apartheid, frankly, and vaccine inequity, and I think that is really the most important global issue.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: Well, I`m sure your term vaccine apartheid resonates with Dr. Moeti. So we have established that 80 percent of the global supply has been hoovered up by those who produced it, the rich nations who made self- interest more important than sharing, despite their promises. What is the actual on-the-ground situation? We have said you`re in your deadliest wave in Africa. You have the least amount of supply. What are you seeing in front of your very noses right now there, Dr. Moeti?

DR. MATSHIDISO MOETI, REGIONAL DIRECTOR FOR AFRICA, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: Yes, it is a deadly combination, in fact. We have had for the last two months, eight weeks, a straight increase in cases every week. And we have had also an increase in deaths, which has just started to slow down. And then we have seen at the same time in June a virtual stopping of availability of vaccines in Africa. So, we had only 450,000 doses of vaccine available for 1.3 billion people in Africa in the month of June. And we`re starting to see also populations getting very tired of the measures of prevention, masks, distancing, and so forth. So all this is really a perfect storm for a third wave, which is unprecedented. It`s 80 percent higher already than the previous wave that we had on the continent. It`s a serious situation. And we believe it hasn`t peaked yet. We have just had Eid in our Muslim believing countries. And we need to anticipate that what that will do in terms of cases and, unfortunately, deaths in Africa.