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Illustration: Liu Rui / GT
The race to approve and distribute a COVID-19 vaccine continues to grab the world with baited breath. If successful, this will allow countries to return to a somewhat normal state as soon as possible.
Hopefully this will finalize and end some of the bitter feelings that some countries have expressed to others. For example, as the coronavirus exploded across Italy and beyond earlier this year, attacks on China have started in earnest. Politics and media figures in parts of the Western world have started to suggest that the blame for the natural outbreak of the virus should lie directly with China.
When China painfully shut down in early 2020, it was often criticized for overreacting. But with the virus largely under control in China, its efforts began to shift towards creating a vaccine to eradicate COVID-19. And even when the dreaded second wave hit Europe and North America in the fall, resulting in record hospitalizations and a significant increase in cases and deaths, complaints against China in parts of the political and media spheres did not grow. are not stopped.
But as the blame game against China continued, the country continued to focus on solutions. These efforts are paying off. While some British, German and American vaccine candidates are showing promising results, China is light years ahead. It is reported that China is on track to produce more than 600 million doses by the end of the year.
Tragically, in parts of the Western world, the vaccine race has become less about health and safety than about nationalism. The United States, for example, has refused to join more than 180 other countries in an initiative organized by the World Health Organization called Covax. This program aims to ensure that vaccines can be distributed in developing countries around the world. But that shouldn’t come as a surprise. In March, after the real dangers of the virus became apparent in the United States, the Trump administration amassed personal protective equipment, which made international distribution difficult for manufacturers like 3M.
Fortunately, China is showing real leadership in the field of vaccine distribution. China currently has five candidate vaccines in phase 3 clinical trials. Due to a shortage of active coronavirus cases in the country, trials are underway in foreign countries including Indonesia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan and others.
China is also going one step further. China even offers loans to countries where purchasing the vaccine could be prohibitive. But it would be a mistake to view these actions in isolation and not part of China’s greater external focus.
President Xi Jinping recently reaffirmed China’s commitment to helping and supporting other developing countries by making COVID-19 vaccines an accessible and affordable public good around the world during the G20 summit speech in Riyadh by video link.
As might be expected, some Western media are suspicious of China’s “vaccine diplomacy” and have expressed concern that the reputation of the United States will suffer. But the answer is obvious: if the United States is afraid of losing its stature, nothing prevents it from following China’s example. America is more than welcome to use vaccines as a way to help some of the world’s poorest countries – not for isolationist purposes.
Clearly, developing effective vaccines will benefit the world, helping to ensure that fewer people die from preventable disease. This will allow the global economy to recover faster, and life can return to normal – or at least semi-normal – as soon as possible. Although China has been baselessly blamed in many quarters for much of the pandemic, its response has clearly been effective. Now the Western world in general, and the United States in particular, can either continue to blame and slander China or join it in helping to develop and distribute life-saving vaccines around the world. To do otherwise would not only be cruel to the developing world, but also extremely doomed in terms of global influence.
Hopefully, the United States will soon realize that China’s scapegoat does nothing of substance. He may have an eye opener and realize that he still has the opportunity to learn from his past mistakes.
The author is an expert in international branding, with a particular interest in China’s image in the Western world. [email protected]
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