India's vaccination policy 'to cost' poorest 20% households 43-86% of monthly income

Counterview Desk
Insisting on a time-bound, equitable vaccine policy to ensure universal access to a free vaccine before it is too late, public health practitioners and civil society members, in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have said that India’s current pace Covid-19 vaccination drive will take 2.4 years to complete, warning, global epidemiologists feel it could take under a year before the virus may mutate making it difficult for current vaccines to contain the spread.
Endorsed by notable civil society members such as Jayati Ghosh, Jean Dreze, Ravi Duggal and Malini Aisola, the letter, which is based on analysis of India's vaccine policy by the top international NGO Oxfam India and the Forum of Medical Ethics Society (FMES), comes amidst claims by the Government of India launching the "world's largest vaccination drive."
The letter says, the live dashboard of the vaccination drive may provide real-time updates about the vaccination amidst the second wave of Covid-19 across India, but many states and Union Territories (UTs) are facing multi-dimensional challenges in implementing vaccination. It insists on the need to accelerate the pace of vaccination in India and put India on the post-covid recovery track by providing free and accessible vaccines is crucial.

An Oxfam note:

567 prominent public health practitioners, doctors, economists, workers unions, human rights groups, student groups, civil society organisations and concerned citizens in India have appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to demonstrate leadership in doing what it takes to address inequalities in supply to ensure vaccines reach the vulnerable and ramp up manufacturing to address shortages.

The collective letter signed by organisations from 22 states and UTs across India have urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to remove barriers to vaccine production through modes like a waiver of intellectual property rights to achieve universal coverage.
Amitabh Behar, Chief Executive Officer, Oxfam India said, “The support for India’s global ask for a patent waiver at World Trade Organisation (WTO) is growing. India’s government needs to show leadership domestically, by lifting patents to its own vaccine and follow its own National Vaccine Policy by ensuring equitable access to everyone to the vaccine but prioritizing the vulnerable and excluded.”

The extremely slow pace of vaccination in India is delaying the pandemic

Overall rates of vaccination are stalling, and shortages are expected to continue until at least July-end. The joint policy brief and analysis by Oxfam India and Forum for Medical Ethics Society (FMES) highlights the several flaws in India’s current COVID vaccination strategy, including failure to adequately explore compulsory licensing of the vaccine. The current policy of differential pricing for the Centre and states and pushing the states to the market for its vaccines, would force India’s poorer and more populous states to pay relatively more. Furthermore, vaccine allocations to states are also not in proportion of the emerging demand from those under 45 or the quantum of COVID cases.

Sunita Sheel, Secretary General, Forum for Medical Ethics Society said, “The Government of India’s approach to COVID-19 vaccine policy stands to be a mockery of Indian Federalism and will be remembered for decades to come for its lethal consequences to common people of India, particularly those at the margins. Given the current global order and deeply interconnected world, lack of access to vaccines anywhere around the world implies threat to global health security agenda. This can be averted only if government puts people first, that is, people over profit and power, NOW!”

COVID-19 Vaccine policy crippled with unfair prices and exclusion

Both Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech vaccine in private hospital will cost an Indian family with 3 adults Rs 3,600 for a full course of the Covishield vaccine or Rs 7,200 for Covaxin. For the poorest 20% of households, this burden will be 43% (Covishield) and 86% (Covaxin) of their monthly income, respectively. Indians are paying world’s highest vaccine prices despite providing significant funding and in-kind support for development of the vaccine and pre-clinical and clinical trials.
Successful vaccination drives are rooted in detailed district plans and social mobilization strategies to reach vulnerable communities; these are missing in this drive. The near complete reliance on on-line appointments for vaccination without providing walk-in facilities tends to exclude those who lack internet access, the elderly living alone, those with disability and populations such as homeless and pavement dwellers and those in institutions.
Only 15% rural households have access to the Internet and only 24% of India’s population has smartphones. A more targeted bottom-up approach is needed to ensure vaccination nearer to peoples’ habitations, especially in high coronavirus prevalence areas. The civil society has urged the Prime Minster to take the following actions to make vaccines accessible for all before it is too late:

Ensure that the vaccine is purchased at true cost prices and provided free of charge to all
Ensure its fair allocation which prioritizes at-risk groups, is sensitive to the existence of the digital divide and can reach the vulnerable where they are
Be rooted in large scale vaccine procurement by the Central Government at regulated prices which do not financially cripple the finances of India’s states or pitch them against each other in the quest of scarce lifesaving vaccines
Immediately enhance financial outlays to public health and do what it takes to make the above happen through all possible steps including compulsory licensing of vaccines and ramping up public sector vaccine manufacturing capacity, to strengthen the public health system to be better prepared for the potential next wave of the pandemic.

---
Click here for the letter/petition to the Prime Minister, here for the policy brief . Please read complete policy brief here

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Warning bells for India: Tribal exploitation by powerful corporate interests may turn into international issue

By Ashok Shrimali* Warning bells are ringing for India. Even as news drops in from Odisha that Adivasi villages, one after another, are rejecting the top UK-based MNC Vedanta's plea for mining, a recent move by two senior scholars Felix Padel and Samarendra Das suggests the way tribals are being exploited in India by powerful international and national business interests may become an international issue. In fact, one has only to count days when things may be taken up at the United Nations level, with India being pushed to the corner. Padel, it may be recalled, is a major British authority on indigenous peoples across the world, with several scholarly books to his credit.

Gujarat Bitcoin scam worth Rs 5,000 crore "linked" with BJP leaders: Need for Supreme Court monitored probe

By Shaktisinh Gohil* BJP hit a jackpot in the form of demonetisation, which it used as an alibi to convert black money into white in Gujarat. Even as party scrambles for answers of how the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB), whose director is BJP president Amit Shah, received old currency worth Rs 745.58 crore in just five days, and how Rs 3118.51 crore was deposited in 11 district cooperative banks linked with Gujarat BJP leaders, a new mega Bitcoin scam, worth more than Rs 5,000 crore has been unraveled.

Counterview

Search This Blog