The United States has fully immersed itself in “vaccine diplomacy”: it has stood up to China and Russia and opened a new geopolitical battle amid the pandemic

The massive donation of serums against the coronavirus announced this Monday by Joe Biden reactivated the “vaccine diplomacyWho is facing Russia, China and, now with much more force, the United States, in a new global geopolitical battle linked to the pandemic.

“It’s kind of a Marshall plan for vaccines because the Marshall Plan was not aimed at the sheer kindness of the United States to European countries after WWII. Its objective was to make Western Europe a wall that would prevent Soviet advance. There were geopolitical and geostrategic reasons ”, he declared. TN.com.ar the international analyst Claudio Fantini.

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And he added: “Now the objective is to prevent the advance of China. Powers turned vaccines into tokens to be part of the global socio-strategic council. The United States, Russia and China are turning their vaccines into “pieces” of this chessboard on which global geopolitics is played out.

“This was how it was raised from the start when the best bet was to aim for collaboration to achieve a global mass vaccination campaign. But the superpowers they chose to turn the world into a racing arena“To see who carried out the vaccination,” he said.

India, center of the world council

In this context, India is the global epicenter of the pandemic, with a collapsed health system after the emergence of a new local variant of the virus, much more contagious and deadly. In addition, the vaccination process is slow in this country.

The international analyst Jorge Castro said TN.com.ar that “the effectiveness of this geopolitics of vaccinations now lies in India”.

“China has a situation of geopolitical conflict with India. And although he offered to send him the vaccines he needs, the government in New Delhi has not given him a response, ”Castro said.

And he added: “The problem is that the United States is a strategic ally of India and it is only now, within these millions of vaccines that Biden has decided to give, that some of the excess of doses that Washington has allocated will be allocated to its main ally. in the Asia-Pacific region ”.

In this way, Washington will fully engage in this silent war on health in the face of growing fear that Beijing will inundate the global market with its own coronavirus vaccines, such as those of Sinopharm (who arrived in Argentina) or Sinovac (marketed for example in Chile).

In addition, with his vaccine Sputnik V, is located in Russia. “In third place, far behind is Russian production. The main game here is between producing vaccines from the United States and, on the other hand, preparing doses from China, ”Castro said.

Although the United States has not officially announced which countries the 20 million doses it has promised to give will go before the end of June, a significant portion is not expected to go to India. .

The global health emergency is at the center of its concerns and it is precisely here that Beijing has tried to put a wedge that allows it to set foot in a country which, until now, has been elusive in its plans for strong economic expansion and global influence.

Message from Biden

Biden, by announcing the donation of vaccines which will formalize his country, sent a strong message by the rise to Moscow and Beijing: his country – he said – “will not use doses to obtain favors“.

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Castro said the United States “has a surplus of vaccines available in excess of 60 million units” and clarified that the North American economy “is experiencing a boom due to the opening derived from mass vaccination of the population“.

“It is an important novelty to decide to place abroad part of this more than 60 million which will no longer be used and which are available”, he declared.

And he added: “Opposite is China, the first country in the world to have succeeded in controlling the pandemic in the second half of last year without resorting to vaccination because at that time there were no vaccines. “.

In this sense, Castro pointed out that China is betting to vaccinate 40% of its population by July and 60% by the end of the year. “Yes indeed, will place more than half of its production in the global system“.

The underlying trend in this Sino-US geopolitical conflict now lies in the production of vaccines, he said. And he concluded: “They are a weapon the United States hopes to use in its geopolitical confrontation with China“.

What will happen in Latin America

This silent struggle for the production and marketing of COVID-19 vaccines is also playing out in the region, beyond severe restrictions due to lack of doses.

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“Brazil has just signed an agreement with Pfizer, Chile has received vaccines from Pfizer and the Chinese from Sinovac and Argentina has Sputnik V vaccines but is negotiating to produce Chinese Sinopharm vaccines, just as it did with AstraZéneca, “he said.

And he concluded: “This battle is also being played out in the region, but the critical point is experienced in India“.