Vaccination campaigns in Europe and the United States are advancing at breakneck speed. But the vast majority of humanity remains without access to vaccines. Nobody will be safe until everyone is safe. How do we address vaccine inequity and ensure that most of the world’s population is vaccinated by 2022? What domestic measures are needed to contain successive waves of the virus in the meantime?
Beyond the immediate task of ending today’s pandemic, scaling up pandemic preparedness cannot wait until COVID-19 is over. The world faces the clear and present danger of more frequent and more lethal infectious disease outbreaks. The current pandemic may ultimately be seen as a dress rehearsal for the next pandemic, which could come at any time, in the next decade or even in the next year, and could be even more profoundly damaging to human security.
The world does not lack the capacity to limit pandemic risks and to respond much more effectively than it has responded to COVID-19. We have the ideas, the scientific and technological resources, the corporate and civil society capabilities, and the finances needed. But our collective task must be to better mobilize and deploy these resources.
