EDITORIAL: For free vaccines

The vaccines must be made available for free so that no one is left behind in the vaccination programme

Even though countries around the world, especially the rich ones, are readying to vaccinate their citizens against the coronavirus on a war footing, there are no signs that this will happen in Nepal anytime soon. The government has not even started the process to shortlist the companies that would be allowed to import the vaccines. The question here is not that of money – the government has set asides Rs 50 billion for the vaccination programme – but who will give the country the vaccines. The rich nations are in no mood to make available their vaccines until they have inoculated their entire population, which leaves the country with few choices about the vaccines it can import. As of now, the government is planning to import vaccines produced by companies in China, India and Russia as they can be stored at a temperature of 2-8 degrees Celsius. The Chinese and Russian vaccines are a priority as they are said to be 90-92 per cent effective.

The government is to issue a notice within a week calling on private and government companies to register for the supply of vaccines against COVID-19.

The government has formed eight committees to expedite the supply of vaccines and the vaccination programme. But the question still remains, when will the vaccines arrive? Of course, high-level delegations in recent days from China, India and Russia have pledged to meet Nepal’s vaccine needs. Russia has made a commitment to supply 25 million doses to Nepal. The government should have planned much earlier to ensure vaccine supply on time as companies in different countries were already testing and rolling about vaccines weeks ago, with hopes of eradicating the virus by the middle of next year. The virus has already infected 244,433 people in Nepal and killed 1,651 people as of Wednesday, although the recovery rate is an impressive 94.3 per cent. India is said to be preparing to vaccinate its population against the respiratory contagion later this month, and a mass vaccination programme in Nepal at about the same time would have been most desirable, given the long porous border with that country.

In such a situation, there is every likelihood of the Indian vaccine being sold in the black market, as with the drug Remdesivir, an anti-viral injection used in the emergency treatment of COVID-19.

The government should already be mulling over how to distribute the vaccines once they arrive here in the country. Delivering the vaccines to every nook and corner of the country without breaking the cold chain is going to be a challenge, although Nepal has plenty of experience with doing so with other vaccines in the past. Regardless of who imports it – a government or private firm – the vaccines must be made available for free so that the vaccination programme is a success and no one is left out. In this endeavour, apart from UN organisations like the World Health Organisation and Unicef, the rich countries must also chip in by making available both funds and vaccines to less developed countries like Nepal as this is a pandemic that knows no boundary. As WHO’s Director-General recently said, ‘vaccines must be shared equally as global public goods, not as private commodities that widen inequalities’.

Joint investment

The Ministry of Finance has issued a Joint Investment Procedure-2020 for the effective implementation of development projects through close coordination among the federal, provincial and local levels.

The procedure was issued to ensure economic returns of the development projects undertaken by the three tiers of the government. As per the procedure, rural and urban municipalities are required to invest a minimum Rs 200 million, metropolis and sub-metropolis Rs 500 million and provincial governments Rs one billion on a development project that helps generate income and manage the operating expenses.

Once this procedure comes into force, the local levels and provincial governments shall feel a sense of ownership of the projects that they have jointly initiated.

While selecting any project, the concerned governments should pay attention to high economic growth, job creation and poverty alleviation. It is also hoped that overdependence on the federal government will be reduced greatly when the local and provincial governments launch a project jointly as per their needs. Joint investment in the productive sectors will also help enhance the institutional capacity of the sub-national governments.