GENEVA: The Red Cross launched a campaign on Thursday to help get 500 million vaccines to people in poorer countries, as Iran received its first jabs from Russia.
While mass vaccinations are ushering in hope that the pandemic will soon end, the World Health Organization is investigating the origins of the disease in China.
But a member of the team told AFP they would not be chasing fanciful theories, including one that the disease was developed in a Chinese lab.
Pressure is growing on richer countries to help in a global inoculation effort, with Red Cross chief Jagan Chapagain warning that the current unequal rollout “could backfire to deadly and devastating effect”.
“It could prolong or even worsen this terrible pandemic,” he said, promising to pour more than $100 million into an effort to distribute vaccines and encourage uptake.
So far, more than 115 million doses have been distributed around the world, but the vast majority of those doses have gone to richer nations.
Experts warn that vaccines will only control the virus — which has killed more than two million — if the whole world is covered.
Otherwise, people will have to continue living under lockdowns with travel restrictions, curfews and closed businesses.
The economic devastation was once again underlined on Thursday with oil giant Royal Dutch Shell announcing more than $21 billion in losses and shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries losing more than $700 million.
On the other hand, wealthy monarchies in the Gulf including Dubai and Saudi Arabia are tightening their containment measures despite the inevitable economic damage.
The World Health Organization has warned against relaxing the rules, emergencies director Michael Ryan saying: “The rain has eased but the sun is not out yet.”
As the policy debate rages around how best to handle the current phase of the pandemic, the UN’s health agency is investigating the origins of the virus.
“We’re not going to come up with the ultimate full understanding of the origins of this virus, but it will be a good first step,” WHO team member Peter Ben Embarek told AFP. The team has visited an infectious disease lab in the city of Wuhan, which was accused by some US officials last year of allowing the virus to leak out.
Elsewhere, the focus is on vaccines — both developing them, and getting them into people’s arms.
The WHO-backed Covax initiative has laid out plans to deliver tens of millions of doses to poorer countries — including to North Korea, which has requested two million jabs despite insisting it has not suffered a single infection.
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