Advertisement
Advertisement
Coronavirus pandemic
Get more with myNEWS
A personalised news feed of stories that matter to you
Learn more
Four of the nine experimental vaccines undergoing phase 3 trials worldwide have been developed by Chinese companies. Photo: EPA-EFE

Coronavirus: why China has left its options open for WHO’s global vaccine plan

  • Along with the US and Russia, it was absent from the list of nations that signed up for the COVAX facility
  • Beijing has already promised access and loans for potential shots and that may be seen as a better bet for its diplomatic agenda, observers say
The deadline has passed for China to join a World Health Organization scheme to equitably distribute Covid-19 vaccines around the globe, as Beijing instead makes its own offers for shots being developed in the country.

It has already promised access and loans for potential vaccines to a number of lower- and middle-income nations – a move the Chinese leadership may see as a better bet for its diplomatic agenda than joining the WHO-backed scheme, observers say.

Along with China, the United States and Russia were also conspicuously absent from the list of 156 countries that have signed up for the programme, known as the COVAX facility.

Participating countries – which include 64 higher-income nations and cover around two-thirds of the global population – were announced by the WHO and its partners Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations on Monday, after the September 18 deadline to join.

01:39

China prepares for coronavirus vaccine mass production though clinical trials are not yet complete

China prepares for coronavirus vaccine mass production though clinical trials are not yet complete

COVAX’s success hinges on buy-in from wealthier nations and commitments from vaccine makers in order to meet its goal of supplying 2 billion vaccine doses, divided proportionally, to participating countries by the end of 2021.

The WHO has expressed hope that China, and other countries where vaccines are being developed, will eventually join or that their companies will agree to supply doses to be purchased under the scheme. Four of the nine vaccine candidates in phase 3 trials globally are made by Chinese firms.

WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said conversations with China were “ongoing and still open”.

Coronavirus: investigation starts into what went right and wrong in Covid-19 response

Beijing has repeatedly said Chinese-made vaccines will be a “global public good”, but has already indicated it plans to pursue its own path when it comes to making doses available internationally.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said earlier this month that China’s plan to contribute to vaccine accessibility and affordability in developing countries “is in essence the same with COVAX”.

Going its own way may provide Beijing with a better platform for using its potential vaccines as a diplomatic tool, according to observers.

“China is using bilateral approaches where they may be seeking concessions or goodwill,” said Drew Thompson, a research fellow with the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.

He points to the example of the Philippines, which has competing claims with Beijing in the South China Sea. The country has been promised “priority access” to a Chinese vaccine.

“If China were to support COVAX, and COVAX were to support the Philippines, what benefit would China derive from that?” said Thompson, noting that Beijing directly working to supply doses could give it “leverage for more concrete outcomes”.

Natasha Kassam, a research fellow at the Lowy Institute think tank in Sydney, said China had been looking to “fill a void left by US disengagement in the multilateral system”. But that did not necessarily mean China would join the WHO in its COVAX facility, she said.

02:35

Philippine President Duterte says he will take Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine in public

Philippine President Duterte says he will take Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine in public

“Beijing generally prefers to engage with countries bilaterally, and will want to use any successful vaccine to further those objectives,” said Kassam, noting that China had left “its options open” for joining COVAX, and may try to delay a decision until after the US presidential election in November.

But without the US on board, China was less likely to allow its companies to supply doses to the facility, according to Lai-Ha Chan, a senior lecturer at the University of Technology Sydney.

“If Chinese vaccines are to be distributed via COVAX, China will lose an essential diplomatic tool to win friends, in the light of the fact that the US vows not to be party to it,” she said.

Coronavirus: reform of WHO may be limited by how much authority it’s given, UN Foundation says

Part of Beijing’s calculus may also be practical, according to Thompson, who noted that a large economy like China may see securing its own interests and those of its close partners and neighbours as more pressing than joining a worldwide scheme.

“China has an interest in getting countries in Southeast Asia in better health so that it can engage them more consistently, [through] trading, tourism,” he said.

But observers also stress that much of this remains hypothetical until China has approved vaccines that are both manufactured at scale and able to meet its domestic need.

“The level to which vaccine distribution can be used as a geopolitical tool by any country depends on many unknowns, not limited to which vaccines, if any, are successful,” Kassam said.

Post