Almost a year ago, the World Health Organization (WHO) officially declared the corona outbreak a pandemic.
Even then it was clear: the most important tool in the fight against the virus is a vaccine.
Several vaccines have now been tested and are on the market.
More than 100 million vaccine doses have been used worldwide.
The vaccination campaigns start quite differently.
While some countries have been using a domestic vaccine for months, there are delivery bottlenecks elsewhere.
The vaccines are not even available for many other countries.
The search for an effective remedy against the novel coronavirus has also become a competition with geopolitical dimensions.
In August 2020, Russia became the first country to ever release a vaccine for the general public.
President Vladimir Putin has been promoting »Sputnik V« since then.
With the speed they wanted to assert themselves against western countries.
The Chinese were even faster.
Hundreds of thousands of people in the country were reportedly given a domestic vaccine last September.
However, the start of Russia's vaccination campaign was repeatedly postponed due to production difficulties.
After all, Russia was able to start mass vaccinations in early December 2020, almost at the same time as some Western countries.
Great Britain made the start, followed by the USA and finally the EU states.
However, the individual countries are progressing at different speeds.
Great Britain has now developed into a pioneer country in terms of mass vaccination.
Hardly any other country has administered more vaccine doses per 100,000 inhabitants.
In the meantime, the second group, those over 70 years of age, is being vaccinated.
However, Israel is the world champion in vaccination.
Within a short period of time, more than two million people received the first dose of vaccine.
Many of the vaccines require a second dose.
In the EU countries, on the other hand, vaccination began more than slowly.
The reasons for that are complex:
In France, for example, vaccination skepticism is particularly high - a problem that Russia also has.
Technical breakdowns made headlines in Germany.
There are also delivery bottlenecks in the EU.
This is probably due to the fact that Brussels hesitantly entered into negotiations with the pharmaceutical companies.
Money is also said to have played a decisive role.
Immunization justice seems to remain an illusion
From a global perspective, the differences between rich and poor are particularly clear.
Immunization justice seems to remain an illusion.
While Mexico and Chile, for example, have signed bilateral agreements with pharmaceutical companies and have been vaccinating for weeks, the weakest countries in the region - such as Honduras or Bolivia - have to wait.
They are dependent on the supranational distribution mechanism "Covax".
In addition, developing countries are often only supplied with vaccines by China and Russia.
There is political calculation behind this.
Many western states prefer their own solutions.
Because of the less transparent processes, they are critical of the Chinese and Russian vaccines.
Three vaccines are currently approved in the EU:
The active ingredient from the German company Biontech and its US partner Pfizer,
the active ingredient of the US pharmaceutical company Moderna
and the product of the Anglo-Swedish company AstraZeneca, which was jointly developed with Oxford University.
In the latter case, delivery bottlenecks are currently causing a dispute with Brussels.
The EU accuses the company of preferring the UK.
AstraZeneca denies the allegations.
Beijing is pursuing vaccination diplomacy strategy
Unlike Western countries, Beijing pursues a vaccine diplomacy strategy.
Many Asian countries have ordered the Chinese vaccines "Sinovac" and "Sinopharm".
The active ingredient "CNBG", which is also Chinese, has so far only been used in its own country.
With the vaccine deliveries, China wants to intensify relations with some countries.
Turkey also gets its vaccine from China.
Even before the first deliveries arrived on the Bosphorus, there were rumors that Ankara could be more indulgent when it comes to Uyghurs in the future.
The Muslim minority is systematically suppressed in China, and the Turkish government has repeatedly positioned itself against human rights violations.
For many countries in the Middle East, the funds from China and Russia are also an alternative to western vaccines.
Here Moscow and Beijing can distinguish themselves against the scarce vaccines from Europe and the USA.
According to its own information, the government in India also wants to supply other countries with the domestic »Covaxin« in the future.
However, the vaccine is controversial.
There are doubts about its effectiveness.
Despite all the difficulties, there is cause for hope:
Studies are already showing the first successes of the vaccination campaigns.
In Israel, for example, the number of new infections is significantly lower in people over 60 after the first vaccination dose.
Since Thursday everyone in the country has been able to be vaccinated from the age of 16.
No vaccine has yet been approved for the age group below.
It may be a while before other countries are as far as Israel is.
In the EU, vaccines should be generally available from September.
In underdeveloped countries this could not be the case until April 2022 at the earliest.
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