It is the call of a global collective of nurses, doctors, emergency medical technicians, medical students and other health professionals.
AIDS Healthcare Foundation joins thousands of medical professionals globally in signing an open letter calling on President Joe Biden to use the full power of the United States government to increase access to vaccines, treatments and diagnoses against COVID19 around the world.
The percentage of people in low-income countries with access to the COVID19 vaccine remains dangerously low. The failure to address critical vaccine and treatment gaps is causing needless death and suffering abroad, as well as allowing the development of new variants that threaten to prolong the pandemic everywhere.
At AHF Latin America and the Caribbean we join this call and invite medical professionals to sign the following letter in support of equity in the vaccine and treatment against COVID:
Full text of the letter translated into English:
Dear President Biden:
We are nurses, doctors, emergency medical technicians, medical students and others across a range of healthcare professions who have witnessed first-hand the devastating effects of COVID-19.
As we continue doing all in our power to bring an end this deadly pandemic, we ask that you please do the same by using the full power of the presidency to get vaccines, diagnostic tools and therapeutics to everyone who needs them around the globe.
It pains us to note that still only a very small fraction of the populations of low-income countries have received any dose of a COVID vaccine. This scarcity is not only unjust and guarantees continued death and economic suffering abroad — it is also directly responsible for the rise of COVID variants that have undermined so much of our domestic progress against the coronavirus. Failure to address the global need for vaccines and treatments is prolonging the pandemic everywhere.
That pharmaceutical monopolies are being allowed to prevent COVID vaccines, test kits and treatments from being produced in as many places as possible as quickly as possible is particularly dangerous and unconscionable. To enable an urgently-needed increase in global vaccine and treatment production, we ask that your administration please:
• Actively cooperate with South Africa, India and other nations to secure a comprehensive and effective emergency waiver of global intellectual property rules so that countries can start producing COVID vaccines, test kits and treatments themselves without waiting around any longer for the permission of pharmaceutical monopolies;
• Leverage the U.S. government’s massive investment in vaccine development, as well as all its existing legal authorities, to force vaccine firms to share their vaccine-making know-how with the many qualified and capable producers around the world; and
• Launch and help fund a global manufacturing plan to support the development of vaccine production hubs around the world.
As you’ve said many times before, we are all in this together. To save millions of lives and restore any semblance of normalcy, the United States must help expand global vaccine, diagnostic and treatment production immediately. Pharmaceutical monopolies cannot be permitted to stand in the way of your goal of vaccinating at least 70% of humanity by the end of 2022.
We rely upon your leadership on this life-or-death matter.
Sincerely,
