Out of Africa: a solidarity-based approach to vaccine allocation

Journal article

Abstract:: This article sets forth a solidaristic approach to global distribution of vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Our approach draws inspiration from African ethics and from the characterization of the Covid-19 crisis as a syndemic, a convergence of biosocial forces that interact with one another to produce and exacerbate clinical disease and prognosis. The first section elaborates the twin ideas of syndemic and solidarity. The second section argues that these ideas lend support to global health alliances to distribute vaccines beyond national borders. The third section introduces ethical criteria to guide global distribution, emphasizing priority to low- and middle-income countries, which have the least ability to obtain vaccines on their own. It also justifies giving priority to people at high risk of infection and high risk of severe disease and death.

Files:: Jecker_and_Atuire_2021_Out_of_Africa.pdf

(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 504.7KB, Terms of use)

Language:: English
Keywords:: solidarity

Covid-19

vaccine allocation

syndemic

African ethics

FFR
Pubs id:: 1270015
Local pid:: pubs:1270015
Deposit date:: 2022-07-28

Copyright holder:: Jecker and Atuire
Rights statement:: ©2021 The Authors. Hastings Center Report published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of The Hastings Center. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.

If you are the owner of this record, you can report an update to it here: Report update to this record