Editor's note:
Roberto Rave is a political scientist with a specialization and postgraduate studies in International Business and Foreign Trade from the Externado University of Colombia and Columbia University in New York.
He also has studies in Administration from the IESE University of Spain and is a candidate for the Master of Business Administration from the University of Miami.
He is a columnist for the Colombian economic daily La República.
He was chosen by the International Republican Institute as one of the 40 most influential young leaders on the continent.
He was an advisor to the Congress of the Republic of Colombia and the Mayor's Office of Medellín, and founder of the Libertank Thought Center.
Follow him on Twitter.
The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author alone.
(CNN Spanish) -
I have been in this discussion for several months with different personalities, from economists to hospital directors, pure humanists and friends of social gatherings.
I have also talked about this with former directors of pharmaceutical companies, all with the purpose of achieving some objectivity in this article.
The pandemic is already one year old in the region and has given a few meters in this tough battle.
However, deaths already exceed the equivalent of the population of cities like Paris and today they continue to occur en masse.
At the same time, the world is experiencing the worst economic crisis after the Second World War and the recovery forecasts are linked to the vaccination process, which is perceived as slow and complex.
As Andrés Oppenheimer describes it: “While Israel had administered 76 doses of vaccines per 100 people until February 16, and the United States 16 per 100, the vaccination rate in Latin America –with the exception of Chile–, is lousy.
By that date, Brazil had delivered only 2.5 vaccines for every 100 people;
Argentina 1.4;
Mexico, 0.6, and Peru, 0.2 per 100 people, according to the Oxford University website ”.
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If vaccination is not given a boost, our region will continue to widen its gaps with respect to the other countries that have managed to resume the path of economic development, while we remain cloistered in the immunization process.
These are some considerations regarding the possibility of marketing the vaccines in Latin America:
The commercialization of vaccines would take the economic burden off the governments of the region, since those citizens who have purchasing power would access immunization with their own resources and also assuming the logistical expenses that this implies.
They are likely to be bought only by the middle and upper class.
Still, this would take a great burden off the state, which will have to focus on the most vulnerable people.
Central governments could more effectively target the most vulnerable population.
The vaccination process would be faster and less expensive for the State.
Private administration is usually more expeditious and quick.
That is why the commercialization of vaccines would help prevent more deaths while motivating savings for governments.
″ Unfortunately, the pandemic is good for corrupt governments.
There is a link between the level of corruption and the response to the health crisis produced by the pandemic, "says Daniel Eriksson, director of Transparency International."
The commercialization of the vaccine would reduce the possibility of corruption in public entities, without forgetting that acts outside the law also occur between private organizations, but without a doubt with less intensity.
Vaccines against covid-9 reflected the importance of private companies and their joint work with governments, achieving in record time finding the solution to this complex situation.
At present, the different vaccines for various diseases can be easily acquired in the market and the systems - for the most part - work in an acceptable way.
I remember that a couple of years ago –when I was traveling from Colombia to Central America and as a requirement of the respective entity–, I got the mandatory vaccinations in a private company.
“The foreign trade of Latin America and the Caribbean had its worst performance in 2020 since the global financial crisis of 2008-2009, mainly due to the economic crisis generated by the global pandemic of covid-19 and the restrictions imposed by governments to stop its spread ”, affirms ECLAC.
The commercialization of the vaccine would be the engine of a rapid and necessary economic reactivation for a region so socially affected by the pandemic.
Already in Colombia, for example, the National Association of Entrepreneurs (ANDI), headed by its director Bruce Mac Master, asked the national government to allow private companies to support the process of immunizing the population against covid-19.
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Every second without vaccination is a life lost, a job lost and perhaps in our region, a family that runs out of food on its plate and takes another step towards the poverty trap.
The economic reactivation must also be accompanied by an emotional reactivation, motivated by the increase in employment and the generation of development and opportunities for all citizens of Latin America.
The fact that a person with sufficient purchasing power accesses the vaccine does not necessarily mean that a person with fewer opportunities is being deprived of this possibility.
On the contrary, it is offering him more possibilities for the Government to focus more strongly on his vaccination and his economic recovery, which is, in the end, that of all the citizens of our region.
These considerations are subject to the production and availability of vaccines, which increases by leaps and bounds month by month.
