Vaccine nationalism: Competition, EU parochialism, and COVID-19

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/jglobfaul.9.1.0009
• Pages: 9-20
• Published date: 30 March 2022
• Date: 30 March 2022
• Author: Binoy Kampmark,Petar Kurečić

Journal of Global Faultlines, 2022

Vol. 9, No. 1, 9—20.

9

Vaccine nationalism: Competition, EU parochialism, and

COVID-191

Binoy Kampmark and Petar Kurečić2

Abstract

This paper considers the forms of vaccine nationalism specific to responses to SARS-CoV-2.

First, it considers the initial vaccine responses to SARS-CoV-2 and how the competition

unfolded in a broader, global sense. The second part considers the way the European

Union adopted its own type of nationalism, despite claiming to distinguish itself as more

humanitarian and equitable in approaching COVID-19 vaccine production, supply, and

distribution. The creation of the export control mechanism, and the threat of its use, was

itself an expression of Euro-nationalism in action. The need to do so was largely a product

of the EU’s own making, given its own contractual relationships with the pharmaceutical

companies. Finally, this paper contends that the advocacy for vaccine passports, championed

by the EU, served to cause parochial ruptures in the bloc for commercial reasons.

Vaccine nationalism: an introduction

On May 4, 2020, the Coronavirus Global Response Initiative, hosted by the European Union,

saw the pledging of €7.4 billion by various world leaders, philanthropists, and celebrities. The

European Commission made the venture sound deceptively united: “Joining forces to acceler-

ate the development, production and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, diagnostics and

therapeutics – on-line pledging event.”3 Representatives from 43 countries, a range of non-

profit entities, and scientific groups also added to the number. The amount pledged was also

deceptive. EU officials had permitted the pledging of money already spent on COVID-19

relief since January 30, making the raised amount more generous than it otherwise would

have been. The United Kingdom was a case in point, having pledged £388 million toward a

total as part of a prior pledge for £744 million.4 The EU bureaucrats were not too forthcoming

about how much in terms of new funding was pledged, making it difficult to spot the

double-counting.

Notable in the pledge were certain absentees: the United States, Russia, Brazil, India,

and Argentina.5 The discovery, manufacture, and eventual distribution of vaccines would

become a “scramble,” drawing attention “to long standing-inequities in public health

between the global North and South.”6 China and Russia were to pursue their programs to

distribute vaccines to low-income countries, attracting accusations of vaccine diplomacy;

the developed world would stress domestic immunization before international distribution,

and in turn be accused of practicing vaccine diplomacy.

While governments can take different steps to achieve this objective [of obtaining

access to vaccines], the most common approach is to secure supplies through contracts

with pharmaceutical manufacturers that prioritise their orders either because their

willing to offer a higher price or because they contract for the supplies at the pre-

approval stage, thus taking a part of the risks connected with the development of the

new vaccine.7

As Ana Rutschman suggests, “vaccine race nationalism appears in the act of reserving

millions of doses of new vaccines for domestic use during a transnational public health

DOI:10.13169/jglobfaul.9.1.0009