Is Ireland's Attempt at Solidarity a Better Vaccine Incentive than a Starbucks Voucher?
Ireland has overtaken the UK in vaccination rates - and its people are contributing to the global effort
Unicef announced yesterday that the Irish public has now donated 1 million Covid vaccines to the developing world through their ‘Get a Vaccine, Give a Vaccine’ fundraising programme. Ireland has also just overtaken the UK in terms of the percentage of the population which has been immunised against Covid.
People in Ireland are invited to donate to the fund when receiving their Covid jags and these are now being rolled out to health workers and vulnerable people across the globe. “We have been simply blown away by the incredible gratitude and solidarity for others that people in Ireland have shown. We have never witnessed anything like it before,” Unicef Ireland Executive Director Peter Power said.
As an incentive, the Irish scheme is a contrast to the UK government proposals - they have been reported to be in talks with companies to offer vouchers for pizza and coffee to incentivise the young to come forward. (Some US states offer free donuts, and even a pre-rolled cannabis cigarette.)
Vaccination rates are slowing in both Scotland and the rest of the UK - six EU countries including Ireland have now got a higher vaccination rate. But one of the concerns that young people I know have about getting vaccinated is that they don’t agree with the politics of it. They wonder why they are being immunised against Covid ahead of the old and vulnerable in the global south.
The kind of incentives the UK government is contemplating seem to stem from the idea that young people are not coming forward because they are lazy and venal and completely motivated by self-interest.
I can tell them right now that a Starbucks voucher won’t work for the cohort who are worried about global justice - in fact it may make things worse.- it is like saying; “just suck up your white privilege and then wash it down with a drink made from beans harvested by some egregiously-exploited older person with underlying health conditions who would, in a fair world, be far more entitled to get a vaccine than you are.”
Global Justice Now’s Nick Dearden told the Guardian this week it is an “insult to the thousands dying each day” that the UK is offering third doses and preparing to vaccinate teenagers while low- and middle-income countries are left “fighting for scraps”.
The group accuse the UK government of hoarding millions of surplus vaccines. Through the Astrazeneca programme, vaccine technology was shared with providers like the Serum Institute of India. That plant was supposed to supply most of Covax’s doses but the Irish Times reports that India’s restriction of exports to combat its own surge means Covax is increasingly reliant on donated doses from wealthy countries.
The UK gov has pledged to donate 100 million donated vaccines by June 2022 - but it is unclear it has delivered any yet, although it announced on July 28 it is planning to start. However, in an article entitled “All Talk, No Jabs” the Telegraph reported last month that only a tiny fraction of the surplus doses that have been pledged by wealthy nations have been delivered.
Unicef Ireland Executive Director Peter Power said that the “get a vaccine, give a vaccine” campaign in Ireland was a way to express solidarity. “It is astonishing that some countries in the world have vaccination rates of less than 5 percent, while the wealthiest countries have vaccinated the vast majority of their populations. By supporting this campaign in huge numbers Irish people have recognised that inequity and have taken this tangible expression of solidarity with people who have no access to vaccines.”