Important, Not Important

A little while ago, I had a conversation with Dr. Madhukar Pai about vaccine equity.In it, I tried to understand why and how developed countries were spending billions on COVID vaccine boosters, but so relatively little in low-income countries.Not to say that nothing has been done, but it’s a pretty clear-cut case where whatever we have done, however complex the system, it’s nowhere near enough.I can’t be more clear here. This will affect you.We’re handing out 21 million shots a day across the world, and yet, 36.8% of the world’s population – 2.9 billion people – still haven’t received a single shot.87% of people in low-income countries still haven’t received a single shot.The international organization that was supposed to shepherd this whole endeavor to vaccinate the world, COVAX, has, however you squeeze it, failed.I want to understand technically what the issues have been, but also as always, to understand why we do what we do when it’s so morally corrupt, when it costs so many lives, and even when all of