Will The Poor Have A Fair Shot At Corona Vaccine?

By Clinton Ochieng

Perhaps during a war is one of the times when the rich and the poor find themselves equally and helplessly staring death in the face.

But if warned earlier, then most of the wealthy can fly their families out of the country before the invasion and leave the poor to fend for themselves. But if for some reason they are stuck in the country then they will be helpless and will be forced to depend on the national army which is paid for by the public.

Services such as national defense are a public good, a commodity or service that is made available to all citizens. The army will be defending both the rich and the poor who have paid for the service through taxes.

Kenya is currently fighting an invisible enemy known as the coronavirus. Protecting citizens falls on the government which has implemented strict measures, including quarantines, curfews, and social distancing to control the spread of the disease.

The last wall of defense against Covid-19 is vaccinating all the citizens.

To this end, the government has announced that it will enlist the help of private investors, kindling, once again, the debate on whether the fight against a pandemic should be left to private business owners.

There are fears that those with deep pockets will jump the line leaving millions of other Kenyans helpless, as private investors take the vaccine where there are large returns.

Covid-19 is not just a national crisis that requires national co-operation, it is also a global crisis that requires global co-operation. However, when it comes to the distribution or availability of the vaccine, flaws have already started to appear at both global and national levels.

Rich countries have been hoarding the vaccines, leaving people in poor countries most of them in Africa and South Asia still exposed. The rich countries with 16 percent of the world population had already bought 60 percent of the world’s vaccine supply.

The government might control the private sector’s speed and efficiency, particularly its existing distribution channel. It can import all the vaccines and then allocate certain amounts to the private sector which will then dispense them. This way, the private sector players will not charge for the vaccine, only their labor and administrative costs.

This will be vital in ensuring that every Kenyan whether rich or poor has access to safe vaccines so that the society and economy can return to normal.