Ethics of a COVID Vaccine

In the last few days, South African television has raised questions about the availability of COVID vaccines. The television debate fanned a now familiar and plausible narrative that the government of the country has botched up again. This easily believable story has been pushed by opposition spokesperson offered extensive airtime. As usual, there is more to the story than is evident in contemporary democratic politics.

Behind the narrative, it was clear that questions remained on the process that led to the vaccine. This included the great science and scientists behind the vaccines, but also government subsidies given to large companies, the testing of the vaccines across the world, and various attempts made to distribute the vaccine in an equitable manner. 

Now, it seems that wealthy countries are getting ahead of the queues. Pushing up the prices, they are threatening the availability of sufficient vaccines for all. In the rush to stem the second wave, the ethics of fair distribution of vaccines are forgotten. The first sign of light at the end of the tunnel has brought back the familiar world and its morality.

The COVID19 pandemic has been difficult to say the least. But it seemed to have elevated a realization of the precarity that faces the world as a collective. And it showed that working together was the only option available for the world. One person who chose to ignore the dangers of the virus exposed potentially many more. And one person who cared could make a huge difference to many. Ironically, the virus brought forth the potential for another world. 

But now that there is some glimmer of hope, the sense of belonging to one world is being jettisoned. Countries that can afford the vaccine are jumping ahead and buying up stocks. Public funds used to subsidize the vaccines are forgotten. Countless people who volunteered to be tested are ignored.

It seems that greed and competition are the only ethical values that determine who gets to live and who gets to die. There are some platitudes passed around about availability of the vaccines in the future.  But the ethics of working together is jettisoned. 

South Africa presents a familiar scenario. The opposition is there to point to the folly of the government. but it too has no real alternative to the ethics of funding that drives the vaccine and its distribution. Given half a chance, it will perpetuate the bifurcated world we have come to accept. A few will be offered the vaccines at inflated prices, while the rest will be herded in crowded and dangerous places. As usual, it will seem that modern science has one again failed delivered a bettter world for all. 

When distress befalls man, he supplicates Us. Then, when We grant him a blessing from Us, he says, ‘I was given it by virtue of [my] knowledge.’ Rather it is a test, but most of them do not know (Qur’an, Zumar, v. 50).