2021 has been a quick journey from checking instagram stories to checking vaccine slots. It is no secret to any citizen with a phone in their hands that the vaccine policy has clearly failed in this great nation. From being the world's largest vaccine exporter to soon to be the world's largest vaccine importer, it was indeed a walk of shame. It wasn't something that the administration never saw coming. Infact they saw it coming from miles away and yet, the lack of responsibility is costing lives every second.
(credits : BBC)
(Credits : National Herald)
Liberalisation of vaccine market at a time of crisis is arguably required according to some. But excessive liberalisation would result in the charioteer losing control over his horses and that's exactly what happened in India.
The vaccination drive that started in January 2021, was a ray of hope to the pandemic cast world. But when rich nations booked vaccines in numbers that was atleast two times their population, India had only booked for 15 million and that too weren't in advance. When countries started investing in advance bookings of vaccines, India did not invest in the capacity expansion and there were no advance orders. The first order was placed only in January 2021, the very same month the vaccination drive started!
India's vaccine production capacity is only 3.3 million doses after a 15% being exported to foreign countries. But unlike other countries, India had no prior orders placed for any of the foreign made vaccines to tackle the production delay that was likely to incur, instead stuck on to the only two COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers in India.
The very same PMCARES fund that was created to meet the expenses to tackle the pandemic, was used in favour of providing vaccine to other countries rather than the citizens being given first preference. No. This wasn't a fact that was bought up by some opposition party, but it was a statement by the government itself that was made in the parliament in March 2021. During mid March, through the vaccine maitri initiative, India had exported more vaccines than those admistered to the citizens. Out of the 2.19 crore vaccine doses which were exported, almost 1.06 crore doses were given out for free to many of the global south countries. Ironically, it is not yet entirely free for the Indian citizens.
To inoculate close to 600 million people falling under the category of 18-44 years, an order of only 300 million were placed and even then, half of it was ordered only on 28th April 2021, (only two days prior to the beginning of vaccination drive for 18-44) which would have a delay of atleast 2-3 months to deliver.
So the next big doubt one might have could be about the financial strength of the nation. Is India a poor country which cannot afford to freely vaccinate its citizens? No. Seems like we are not a poor nation. According to India Ratings and Research, only 0.36% of India's GDP is required to vaccinate every citizen above the age of 18 and that is close to a 100 crore people. Instead the government created a supply bottleneck and left prioritising the doses to the manufacturers.
The government's ego of holding up the "atmanirbhar bharat" instead of saving the lives of citizens wouldn't have been hurt too, had India booked vaccines like the other countries way before India's vaccines were approved to be rolled out. Instead, on 13th April 2021, India had to take a shameful retreat from its very own atmanirbhartha and have approved to take in foreign vaccines. And the embarassing tales didn't end there for the central government.
To evade the responsibility of unavailability of vaccines, differential pricing policy and shifting the procurement responsibility to the state heads with a political aim only resulted in the worse of the people.
How long will this chaotic situation stay on is something only time can answer. How long until we get out of this mess is not for time to answer, but for the government. The government that took an oath to abide by the constitution and to protect the lives of this country's citizens. But instead, people weren't just ripped off their rights but also their lives. For the sake of showing off the dominance in numbers at election rallies, thousands had to gasp for breath. For the sake of having a tall image for the government, thousands of frontline warriors had to fall.
At the end of the day, here we are losing our loved ones each day while we are left with no choice but to fuel predatory capitalism by surrendering the right to live with dignity. Almost every high courts in this nation along with the honourable supreme court through its suo moto has taken notice of the situation and meanwhile we are still glued to our devices to get a slot before it's too late for even the vaccines to work. Unfortunately, such crises will keep arising until the day comes when governments will value human lives over political agenda.
🔥🔥🔥🔥
ReplyDelete