Vaccine inequality is racist

31 May 2022

States are obligated to eliminate all forms of racial inequities by purpose or effect, as stated by the International Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. The fight against racism is also the fight for vaccine equity.

In a historic statement, the UN connected the dots:

It affirms that the unequal distribution of vaccines “manifests as a global system privileging former colonial powers to the detriment of formerly colonised states and descendants of enslaved groups”.

Can we call by any other word than *racist* the fact that only 17% of Africans have been fully vaccinated against 75% of people in high-income countries?

The reasons attributed to this included vaccine hesitancy, but the cause is elsewhere. Colonial legacies have structured social hierarchies within and between countries and have laid the ground for the inequality that affects different countries and peoples.

When countries deny their role in colonialism and don’t actively fight inequality, they are racist. The donation of doses and other charity strategies proposed by Northern countries are more of the same — photo-op smokescreens to disguise the permanence of unequal structures they profit from. The WTO is an instrument designed to support these structures and keep them exactly where they are.

Join the #Fem4PeoplesVaccine rally for the adoption of a meaningful TRIPS Waiver

#EndCOVIDMonopolies #WTO #MC12 #WEF22 #Davos #WHA75 #TRIPSWaiver