World Coronavirus Dispatch: EU leaders urge Biden to export vaccines

Pope backs patent waiver on vaccines, US States turning down vaccines as demand declines, and other pandemic-related news across the globe

Pope backs patent waiver on vaccines

President Biden and Pope Francis urged people to get vaccinated and underscored the need for global vaccine equity during a special broadcast. In a video message, Biden called on Americans to get vaccinated so that people can return to normal activities. The video was part of the Global Citizen event, “VAX LIVE: The Concert to Reunite the World,” which aims to promote global access to vaccines. Hosted by Selena Gomez, the concert also included performances by Jennifer Lopez, Eddie Vedder, the Foo Fighters and J Balvin. In another video, Pope Francis signaled his support for the suspension of Covid-19 vaccine patents to help make shots more accessible for poor and middle-income nations. Read here

Let's look at the global statistics

Global infections: 157,703,626

Global deaths: 3,283,422

Nations with most cases: US (32,686,462), India (22,296,081), Brazil (15,145,879), France (5,829,166), Turkey (5,016,141).

Source: John Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

EU leaders urge Biden to export vaccines now and worry about patents later

European Union leaders urged US President Joe Biden to lift restrictions on exports of Covid-19 vaccines to address the desperate needs of developing countries before embarking on complex discussions about whether patent waivers might also boost supply in the longer term. Gathering in Portugal shortly after the US suggested suspending intellectual property rights to boost the supply of Covid shots, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and Italy’s Mario Draghi appealed in unison to the US president to follow the EU example and start shipping significant numbers of vaccines. They argued that any patent waiver will only increase supply in the long term and the world needs a faster solution. Read here

US States turning down vaccines as demand declines

Declining demand for coronavirus vaccines in the US is causing states across the country to refuse their full allocations of doses from the federal government. Reduced demand, which is contributing to a growing stockpile of doses, comes as nearly 46 per cent of the US population has received at least one dose and about 34 per cent are fully vaccinated, according to the CDC. Last week, Joe Biden announced a plan to get at least one dose of vaccine administered to 70 per cent of the nation’s adult population by July 4 – a date also fixed for a full-economic and social interaction re-opening of America. Read here

Opinion: Authoritarian states are using vaccines to subvert democracy

China and Russia are engaged in a diplomatic offensive to gain maximum advantage from the global distribution of their vaccines. Asia -- along with Latin America and Africa -- is poised to be a major recipient of these vaccines. For authoritarian countries involved in global vaccine diplomacy, these tools meant to strengthen their soft power are often exploited to become sharp. First, as vaccines began to be developed, authorities in Russia and China employed information manipulation strategies to sow distrust in Western vaccines. Read here