they think effect on people's lives malcolm webb al-jazeera central african republic. i've. got you all deserve means a whole run a reminder of our top stories more than 20 people have been killed and dozens dozens wounded in a suspected twin suicide attack in iraq's capital now the explosions happened in a baghdad market suicide attacks had become a rare thing in the city the last one happened in 2019 hours after being sworn in as the 46th president of the united states joe biden assigned 17 executive orders and actions dismantling some of donald trump's contentious policies they include a rollback of the immigration ban targeting muslims and having the u.s. rejoined the paris climate of called. well i mean i'm proud there's executive action. by keeping the promises were made people are going to go.

to. our board we're going to need for. the 1st order here is. to. come. which we call. the long. word or i have a part mask you want children to be kept on from your property an interstate commerce and center this is the 1st time. this is made history of her swearing in breaking. barriers the former california attorney general is the 1st woman vice president and also the 1st black person to be elected into the role they don't get ration was a unique ceremony the public were told to stay away due to the pandemic 1000 national guard troops were deployed across washington to prevent a repeat of the riot on capitol hill earlier this month. china's foreign ministry is accusing trump's administration officials of undermining relations between the 2

sides that welcomes the chance to repair ties of the president by the on the that will anyone that the 2 sides should show courage and wisdom we need to heed and listen to each other with respect this is the joint responsibility of our 2 countries and also the aspiration of the international community we believe the better angels in china's u.s. relations push surely defeat the evil forces. china has expressed concern over twitter's decision to lock the account of its u.s. embassy the social media giant blocked the account after it made a post to sending its policies towards weaker muslims the embassy tweeted that we go women we're no longer baby machines thanks to the government policies to eradicate extremism twitter says this violates its policy of dehumanization and you can follow their stories of course on our website at al-jazeera dot com more news in half an hour with a clock until then it's inside story to stay with us here on al-jazeera.

rich countries said accused of not sharing covert 900 vaccines with foreign nations and the. catastrophic moral failure as coronavirus continues to spread. the program of millions of coronavirus that have been administered in wealthy countries while in one of the world's poorest guinea only $25.00 doses have been

given the global vaccine sharing fund kovacs says it's preparing to deliver its 1st supplies in february but is competing with nations striking their own lucrative deals with manufacturers to secure the majority of doses the head of the world health organization has warned the wall there is on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure which will cost many more lives. more than 79000000 doses of vaccine have now been. in at least 49 higher income countries just 25 daughters have been given in one lowest income country not 25000000 not 25000 just 25 i need to be blunt the world is on the brink of a catastrophe moral failure and the prize of

this failure will be paid with lives and livelihoods in the world's poorest countries. now with a more infectious variant of the virus identified last month the scramble for the exams among countries who can afford them has only intensified well help organizations pandemic review panel co-chair and former liberian president ellen johnson sirleaf expressed disappointment in the vaccine plans which she said means shots won't be widely available across africa until 2022 or even 2023 she says it's no exaggeration to say that we are at risk of creating a distribution system grounded in iniquity. we're going to go to i guess just in a moment but 1st let's take a look at how many people have been vaccinated so far more than 46200000 doses in 51 countries have been administering that's according to data collected by bloomberg israel has vaccinated the most people per capita with more than one in 4

israelis having received a dose of the pfizer biotech formular it's followed by the u.a.e. and bahrain in the u.k. just over 6 percent of the population of $66000000.00 have received a vaccine shot in the united states it's more than 4 percent guinea is the sole low income country to have delivered any shots at all so far last week providing doses of the russian sputnik back seemed to only 25 people and that's including the president. but joining me now are our guests in the roberts are the dean ibrahimi director of med biotech a medical biotechnology laboratory he's also professor of medical biotechnology at the university mohamad the 5th in oxford we have dr julian savulescu professor of practical ethics at the university of oxford and co-director of the welcome center for ethics and humanity and in new delhi we have ramadan luxman that ayaan an epidemiologist and senior research scholar and actress at princeton university

a very warm welcome to you all thank you for joining us on inside story i'd like to start with you mr. doctor we heard there said that the world is on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure at the price of this failure he says repaid with the lives and livelihoods of the world's poorest countries is that a fair assessment in your opinion. well i think that it could be an outcome i think the w.h.o. is certainly correct to cite would be a catastrophic moral filey finally out to why stuart just follows all of a very viable and valuable vaccine but i think we also need to understand why this apparent stockpile is occurring in developed countries and that's for several reasons 1st of all these were pre-approval purchases before we knew which vaccines were going to be effective when they were going to be approved and how long the vaccines would be effective for and that kind of financing was also necessary to

bring back scenes to market so although it appears that countries will have 3 times as much vaccine as their population needs in my view there's still spice for those countries to die tonight to kovacs excess back saying once they've met their country's requirements ok. not ion there were says when that when vaccines came rich countries who had pretty books those vaccines they would be ready while low income countries would be made to wait for basically whatever is left is that is that what's happening now. well keep in mind that as our as the other panelists will back scenes that will creep booked and many of the developing countries already waiting for the kovacs facility to be the source for them to produce vaccines and certainly the 1st orders will be goal will go to those who are pre-booked the other part of the story of inequity of distribution is simply that

you know that a lot of the lot of the vaccines that are getting out of the modern the pfizer m.r.e. vaccines which are stored at very low temperatures are going to simply not the facilities to deliver these in lower middle income countries at the current time so it isn't as of all it actually was peaceable for these countries as only a subset of it is and there would be more vaccines that get developed over you know and get approved over the next few months so i think it's still a little bit of early do this with a back to you know saying that this huge inequity there is but because systems are in place and some of these studies and they're not in other countries india will your example of a country which is a you know along with a little country but which i anticipate we'll see vastly more coverage told him in numbers but perhaps women percentage terms very soon just because india has made their investment in the backseat and india also has the manufacturing capacity right it already had that infrastructure there i'd like to bring in mr brahimi we

had there from our earlier panelists talking about kovacs i want to ask you does kovacs have the capacity to meet the needs of lower middle income countries and what happens the longer that those countries have to wait what does that mean for the virus's ability to mutate. what i actually came thank you for the invitation but i think i'll have to go back to the numbers there's no way i would lots listen to the numbers 14000040 millions for the richest country or the country from manufacturing the vaccine and 2525 it's amazing i'm shocked i'm shocked and angry actually i think you can give any excuses we want to but i think that is no excuse that's actually to share i think i have no excuse you can give me that they were pre-booked they were by idiots they bait for i did they wrote that there is no need that's kind of they're going to have 5 times more worth its needs

there is no need for europe or for america to get 5 times 3 times what they need i think that's a really really shocking to me i think the virus more was more human than humans actually because the virus actually was very democratic and didn't make a difference between poor and rich country and here we have taken a distinguished distinction between poor and rich country and that that given the strategy is wrong because i think and that's coming back to your question because even though you live africa out with its virus the virus will need to fly the virus will get its variants and even you folks in your rich country may be in globalized word you would be having and your borrowing to come into your place so i think the strategy would have been a more human one and just as we were in 2 words as humans coming out of it as humans by saying we saved the lives of people at risk let's say and i mean i didn't

i want to pick up on something you said you mentioned canada having 5 times that supply so yeah i think you're referring to the fact that's being figured out that if all of the vaccines that are in critical trials were approved then that then canada would be able to that its population 5 times of but you can you really blame canada for wanting to cover its bases. but now they cover their bases now with no that's all the vaccines are good there is no way that you can just keep them i can instill that in the beginning you didn't know which one will be working but now by december lots of countries new which might soon be working and if they can right now there is no need to pile up what you have to do just as saying to yourself as a human is not anything guess what as a scientist i'm not talking as a scientist i don't want to do ok as a scientist as a humans as i am really caring for my all the people as i am cared for people with

morbidity in my country i want to say people in other countries and after the 2nd step will be go into the general of the community the herd immunity or the global immunity the steps to the to the must vaccination rotten people are to rest and that's all come to the next step with the moderate step how to talk about the business of vaccines the economy a vaccine mr locke's may not a on how much money a drug company is really making from these vaccines as i see johnson and johnson astra zeneca have pledged to sell the vaccine at a cost that only just covers their costs so who is making money here. so i think that you know it's going to be highly inequitable because you know the $150.00 teams many promises to the companies but the 1st few developers will have an advantage because they can charge a higher price and and the people who come after will both have more expensive trials because they love to show that acting works against you know existing

vaccines you can't do the civil trials you know probably not for much longer and the other part of course just market advantage but to get to the point about you know what the fair way to do this with the i think i would absolutely agree with the other passengers that the fair way to do it would be that to identify people at risk globally wherever they might be and make sure that they are the ones that are prioritize and this is really what kodak seeks to do and i believe that we are still having a conversation which is the early days in there which makes a lot of the world back in biggest back to america actually as literally started vaccinating only 2 days ago i think it's a bit early to to say that this was a drug that doesn't work let's give it a couple of months i'm sure there be other issues that come along the way that we think are unanticipated with the back scene and certainly not all the back into the work as you correctly said you know canada is not going to have 5 times the number of vaccine and nor will canada want to vaccinate the population 5 times over i

would imagine that canada would both remain the vaccine you know for other countries and they're starting now to build up multi-year stone miles i highly doubt that's going to be the case but i do think that doubly true you know should go beyond just calling out the problem which is a good 1st step but i think they should also figure out mechanisms to help the poorer countries also figure out how to prioritize how to get ready and there are countries like india which are now already shipping back into other countries in spite of there being a massive need in india and i believe. the russians of daughter of the chinese have done that as well so it isn't as are all the back scenes of only go out of the countries in which they matter of fact so i think it's still a bit early there is. research you have work to make sure it's equitable but we also need to think about what that equity really means and i also agree with this point that i think globally your rocks need 1st people who are at bottom 3 risk

which is health care workers next to the bottom 3 1st which is people you know who are elderly or commodities and then you get the one else to see what i'm going to do it actually look like throughout the world we're going to talk about that then but later i want to come back to you dr subtle isco you are a professor of practical ethics i want to talk about the ethics of kovacs as i've been here i was set up to give that block a better chance at negotiating prices with the drug companies who make the vaccines in the face of a global pandemic one must question that entire set up right that drug companies would be able to extort countries when the fate of the world is at stake. well in an ideal world we would have a world government that distribute the vaccine according to ethical principles around the world w.h.o. is not a world government we have nice sions and we have markets and kovacs is

a fantastic initiative that runs in parallel. but you know we have to live with a world that we we have kovacs has made some strides to get half a $1000000000.00 says all courses ready for 2021 in timing for 2000000000 and and the the market in some ways has worked the oxford astra zeneca back saying $2000000000.00 says have been provided to fax those are being also provided that cost india is producing that vaccine at skyll russia has contributed $1500000000.00 says charter and all the several $100000000.00 so countries ah attending to then they of less developed countries it could be better and kovacs could could have more and they're certainly correct to put pressure on other countries but these vaccines are developed through

a market and that is the reality of the world and we know we have to work with that not against when you talk about doses being donated do you think that's really out of the good and out of the goodness of the hots of these countries or is this an opportunity to exercise thought power. well i mean to be honest with you there's a huge self-interest for rich countries to ensure global coverage because you know this pent pandemics saying to our country boundaries if there's a reservoir in one part of the world it will move to the other part of the world so you know this is something where you know self-interest will all and to some degree with ethics. i don't think it's purely go out of self-interest i think there are genuine and equal concerns to ensure that that the people who need the back saying get it i don't think it's about exercising power at least not in the opposite astra

zeneca case perhaps china and russia are saying opportunities for regional influence but at the end of the tie we want the vaccine to get to as many people as quickly as possible. but he may we talk about you know everyone is trying to roll out the sexing so quickly as quickly as they can but might just actually be an ongoing issue because we don't know how long immediacy lasts for so might it be that we're going to have this problem every year while i think that is a lot of dosh when actually they would if you were to be lost and quite a bit actually to have to pay for that $1.00 of them came in november and then kind of turn around $1.01 in britain we showed actually people with a not for it is actually going to get some taxes by the department can claim it's here for at least a month so i think this is a proper case that's there when if you screw up or rude or birds for the buck you know actually i think that is to what is actually they showed her the period of the vaccination they got like 3 months and they think that the clot or the

fantasy of the crown of ours was pretty stable scaring off and with the subsequent one actually lots of people kept it for 4 years but i was not to jump back to the situation of the poor countries i think we have to sort of critic what we are doing nice. i think we were didn't support the w. ritual and not actually between the bickering between china and the us i think poor countries and developing countries should have jumped in and say you can actually interview this school have prof if you cannot have it with w. ritual big but the matter of life for a lot of people who work on the 2nd quarter that is for the marketing boards i think what's going to happen in this country is we can go back to each idea and a situation will not or cannot do or the patent to hold for a simple reason i cannot protect you no account of the company against the health

of the population is what happened in south africa not for example risk breaking the rules of the patent and libby will be coming back soon to haunt this company is there not when and where country is not willing to share their actually ok i want to talk about the w.h.r. dominant loves me not a on you brought up the w.h.o. earlier does the situation where i now call into question for you at all the leadership or the effectiveness of the world health organization you remember at the time as well watching the virus spread there was a lot of pressure on the w.h.o. to declare that the pandemic and held off do you think there should be questions about the w i chose handling. was this always the questions about how the bleacher palms because the bleacher is is accountable to all of the member countries and remember that at least operates within the u.n. system but the head of the debate was actually elected by the world health assembly

which is made up of the ministers of el or all of the countries that are part of this will have family and i think there will be a calling to account without question there already is an examination of what actually went on in the composition doubly sure in china back in january 3rd and there are important questions that remain to be answered but at the same time w.h.o. in the 'd you know the depleted organization and as a shadow of what it was 20 years ago i've been working with the beach over many years as i'm sure my fellow panelists have been and the lack of funding of w.h.o. the deep prioritize ation but also w.h.o. itself being unable or unwilling to undertake significant reforms which again come back to the world cup assembly because it's a whole bunch of countries that unless the world decides started want a strong effective and a nimble doubly sure it will not get there at the end of the day there's no point

pointing fingers at this one organization the organization reflect the dysfunctionality of global governance of institutions at large and the 1st step which i'm looking forward to tomorrow is where hopefully as president biden had promised the u.s. will rejoin w.h.o. and it's and will and that would sort of bring us to a sense of stability that we we recognize that the world solves problems together not by you know what america 1st or some other country 1st kind of approach the focus of alaska what do you think we can learn from past global pandemics when that thing took a long time to get to some countries as opposed to others what lessons should we have learned. well i mean the 1st place unease if we are all in this together. do you see is you know a global problem that we cannot just close the door of our country and expect not to be affected by it so we do need a global approach and it is

a challenge to it to achieve that but i think we are making some headway into it the other thing i think is that you know if you look at the eradication of smallpox you need to do extraordinary coordination i mean and they did some cases mandatory measures to achieve the eradication of smallpox now it's covered 19 is not smallpox i think it won't be eradicated it will be more like flu that it will mutate we will need to be revaccinated and we'll need to learn to live with it so in some ways i think we need to learn from how we've we've managed flu pandemics to to look at how we can manage covert 19 but at least in the short term it may be that we need mandatory measures and we need much greater global coordination must as a dane ever hear me i want to ask you what you make all the time is approaching vaccination its working population to get them back to work 1st and what do you think would be

the best approach i know it's obviously varied across the continent but what would be the best approach for africa why africa i think we have to make a statement that's that african union is a failure actually that's big then how come are there $54.00 countries couldn't actually manage to have one vaccine that rocks or produce a maxi i think we have 2 critical percent that think anyone in that piece as it ought to block in lots of institutions could have more of the who are actually in the brink you know. i don't see and i think actually in africa i think the way to do it so i think it's a we have no leverage and that's the reality of things wrap no. average of but against either the rich countries either of the manufacturing countries like india and china and if china basically or russia want to play a joke or attacks with the vaccine it will be tough to do all through to actually

come to them the only way that we could do it actually is to help our self and in the next i will be ready to the rock drugs the road vaccine in africa without needing to actually rely on other countries doctors have a lesko do you think governments will spend more seriously now on pandemic preparedness. well i'm to be honest. it's very fortunate that coven 19 ease is not as lethal as spanish influenza so you know on a on a on a long term sky. this this is not one of the worst pandemics that we've had so we're going to get worse pandemics than this and we also have the possibility of bio weapons. intentionally constructed biological weapons which are very easy to manufacture and if if if ebola was bio engineered to be

as can tell you just it's covert 19 you would be a total catastrophe so and those events you know are possible you know you know backyard laboratory you can create a virus capable of wiping out not you know millions but hundreds of millions of people so we need to radically rethink our preparedness to pay damages this is one of the greatest existential threats not coded no entity but a future pandemic and we were totally all prepared with the preparation of pay pay or personal protective equipment. we've been able to develop a vaccine in that year but we still don't understand the disease we need to rethink doing challenge studies to rapidly develop understanding of disease and more rapidly develop vaccines i think i'm going crazy saying message for a very seriously will be digesting this for a very very long time we'll have to leave it there for time thank you to all of our

guests as athena behind me you're going to have a screw and nominate him. and thank you too for wanting and you can see the program again any time by visiting our web site dot com and for further discussion go to our facebook page that's facebook dot com fold slash inside story and also join the conversation on twitter handle is at inside story for me can be found and the whole team here. a lot of the stories that we cover all highly complex social very important we make

them as understandable as we can do as many people as possible no matter how much they know about a given crisis or issue all of the faults of subsiding hysteria the smell of death is overpowering as al-jazeera correspondent stress will be strong to do. criminal drug dealing shifted to places beyond the reach of the a good many people in afghan government to enforce the new drug trade guerilla wars in colombia. i'm to mexico where the cartels have been responsible for a muscle a spiral of violence. the final episode of drug trafficking politics in our territories on al jazeera. kenyan journalists in pursuit of press freedom and justice i have the feeling think it's great situations where someone says something about the culture can afford being clean and investigating government corruption in

the national health care system the more they transaction to see nigel the killer the money that is unexplained to africa uncensored and publish those things up people don't want to publish many of the doesn't mean that the us care is truth is it anyway on al-jazeera. i live in a clock and all the top stories here on al-jazeera at least 28 people have been killed and dozens injured in a suspected twin suicide blast in iraq's capital police say it happened in a market impact that it's. the death toll is expected to rise some of the wounded in a critical condition suicide bombings have become a rare occurrence in the iraqi capital in.