The Guardian view on Africa’s MPOX outbreak: Covid lessons must be learned | Editorial
AAfter two years of post-Covid talks, World Health Organization (WHO) member states failed this summer to agree on plans for a fairer distribution of vaccines to developing countries. Ensuring that life-saving doses are available to countries that need them most, rather than just those with the deepest pockets, is not just a moral imperative. It is in every nation’s self-interest, given the tendency of viruses to mutate and migrate. But achieving this will require large sums of money and big concessions from pharmaceutical companies. And so, dispiritingly, the tug-of-war continues.
Perhaps the warnings about a new, more serious variant of mpox in Africa will finally get attention. Last week, the WHO said declared the current outbreak of the virus “a public health emergency of international concern”. MPOX is highly contagious and can be spread through skin-to-skin contact, sharing of contaminated equipment and contact with animals. The new “clade 1” variant appears to have a significantly higher mortality rate of around 4%. Cases have now been identified in 13 African countries, the vast majority in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). More than 500 people have died so far.
The first recorded infection outside Africa, in Sweden, led the UK Health Security Agency to update her guidelines to doctors regarding the new strain. Production of a vaccine, based on those developed to eradicate smallpox, is now underway scaled up by Danish biotech company Bavarian Nordic. The company’s stock price shot up dramatically last week as new orders came in.
Countries that have not yet been affected are of course right to be concerned. But while governments in the Global North are hoarding resources, mpox is being allowed to spread almost unchecked in the regional epicenter. A disastrous combination Domestic regulatory delays, a slow international response and a lack of funding mean that DRC has virtually no access to vaccines. The price of an MPOX shot has been estimated at $100 (£77). That puts mass vaccination programmes well beyond the reach of governments already unfairly burdened by disproportionate debt repayments to Western creditors. Acts of generosity from wealthier countries have so far been small and inadequateThe US has committed 50,000 shots but has the capacity to deliver many more of the millions of doses needed.
Along with other wealthier nations, the US should take the lead. The African Union’s public health agency estimates that some $4 billion will be needed across the continent to undertake vaccination, surveillance and education, with a focus on a region already ravaged by poverty, malnutrition and conflict. Only a fraction of that has been pledged so far. After collectively taking their eyes off the ball last year, less serious The outbreak of the mpoxvirus in Central Africa now confronts the international community with an even more dangerous situation for which it is unprepared.
During Covid, richer countries shamefully hoarded vaccines. Boosters were delivered to citizens of the Global North, while low-income countries had to scramble for funding and access to get their people the first doses. Going forward, there must be long-term solutions to promote greater vaccine equity, including technology transfer to poorer countries. Right now, however, a belated sense of urgency and focus is needed to address a foreseeable crisis in the DRC and neighboring Central African states.