Thursday, February 04, 2021

We Haven't Yet Learned

Forty years ago, we were told that global capitalism would produce a better world. It hasn't exactly worked out as planned. Glen Pearson writes

Not all that long ago, we learned that successful capitalism was about the effective balance between supply and demand. The pandemic experience of these past 12 months has added one more classification to that formula that we have frequently overlooked: distribution.  In a globalized world, where free trade agreements connected nations across a vast spectrum, the wheels were greased for the rapid movement of goods, unencumbered by overbearing regulations.  We took it for granted that what we wished for was readily available.

That world is gone for now, its place interrupted by blocked supply chains, border restrictions and less disposable cash.  The most pressing examples are COVID vaccines.  The demand is in the billions of people, the supply in the hundreds of millions of doses, and the distribution … well, there’s the rub.  The cause for all the confusion is to be found in how rich nations are competing with one another in a fashion similar to a frontier capitalism reminiscent of the past.

It’s a travesty in its own way.  The lightning-like development, testing and production of the various vaccines has been unequalled in history and yet the vials remain largely undelivered and unused.  This is made even more confounding when we hear that rich nations have over-ordered vaccines by the millions while poor nations like Nigeria, Mexico, Zimbabwe and Pakistan are still awaiting shipments.  This is all happening while, according to Duke University research, wealthy nations have already bought up 6.4 billion doses and are sparring over another 3.2 billion about to be produced.

It’s not hard to understand what’s going on here.  Voters, fatigued following a year of public health controls, financial downturns, and loss of social mobility, are increasingly demanding that their governments get on with vaccinations so they can get on with their lives.  The longer that takes, the more precarious becomes any government’s hold on power.

Perhaps, given human nature, all this was inevitable. One thing is clear: selfishness is alive and well:

Foreign Affairs wrote last week that while Japan, Australia, and Canada account for less than 1% of the world’s coronavirus cases, the three nations secured more than all of the Caribbean and Latin America combined, which represent 17% of global COVID cases.

Moreover, we were woefully unprepared for the pandemic:

It was only a year ago the we were alerted to the presence of this invisible force emanating from somewhere in China.  Repeatedly warned it could end up in the West, virtually every country was woefully unprepared, despite their touted advanced health systems.  The brand of government – Left, Right, Centrist – didn’t really matter; they were outmatched.  The exceptions could be counted on the fingers of one hand.

Somehow, a blind spot emerged among numerous economists and corporate spokespersons, who claimed that the economy should come first.  Nations accepting that advice quickly learned just how expensive a botched pandemic recovery can be.

The International Chamber of Commerce weighed in last week on how ignoring the vaccination needs of poorer nations could have a disastrous economic effect on the West, estimating a loss of $1.5 trillion –  $9.5 trillion (US) should the present oversight continue.  Even more sobering was their belief that one-half of that loss would be borne by those wealthy nations busily securing an oversupply of vaccines over the dire needs of their poorer cousins.

COVID has put the lie to globalization:

While politicians contented themselves with viewing the global financial system like a game of chess, the reality is that it is more like pool, creating a multitude of complications that could never be fully known when the shot was taken.  The rich nations created this economic order in order to gain material advantage.  To continue in that practice in the midst of a pandemic only shows just how self-serving capitalism can become when the bottom line takes precedence over the health workers on the front line.

And it appears that most of us haven't yet learned that lesson.

Image: m.youtube.com


14 comments:

Anonymous said...

From the virus' point of view, the herd is the global population. As long as the global population hasn't achieved herd immunity, the virus will continue to mutate into vaccine-resistant strains and reinfect vaccinated populations. We are seeing this already, as the vaccines we have are less effective against new strains coming out of South Africa and Brazil.

It makes no sense for the rich to hoard vaccines at the expense of the poor, but we still think we can buy our way out of problems. The pandemic is showing us that we can't. Do we learn this lesson in time to tackle global warming? My hunch is that we don't.

Cap

Owen Gray said...

You correctly observe, Cap, that we believe we can buy our way out of problems. We conveniently forget what we all should know. There are some things that money can't buy.

jrkrideau said...

While i agree with most of the editorial where does this come frow yet the vials remain largely undelivered and unused.

Canada has some huge reserve stored up in Alert where it is easier to keep the Pfizer vaccine cold?
What I am hearing is that vaccine producers are desperately trying to increase output, not that we have oodles of vials sitting in storage.

In a few months, given some of the purchase options we and a lot of other rich countries have in place we could be awash in vaccines but now...?

I would hope that we redirect that we redirech that surplus to COVAX as believe the Gov't has promised but right now no one seems to be sitting on stockpiles.

jrkrideau said...

Totally OT but as a former English teacher you may enjoy book reviews. This one is oriented to history. not literature but you and your readers might enjoy a good rant.
Review of a book I have not read and have absolutely no intention of wasting money on!

thwap said...

If politicians believed the pandemic was real (and it was/is) then the goal should have been total eradication. A short, sharp, shock. Quarantines, massive testing and tracking. Border closing. Utilize the Notwithstanding Clause.

Otherwise, it's like doing a half-assed job of putting out a fire. Putting out some hot-spots but not others, eventually you have an inferno on your hands. Put it out as quickly as possible.

If the pandemic is real (and it is) then why just ignore the anti-mask, covid-deniers? Don't try to get them onside. Don't break-up their rallies. Just allow them to act as super-spreaders and hope for the best???

The vaccine effort should have been international. full cooperation across all countries' researchers. And production should be given for any entities that have the capabilities. Instead we're allowing PROFIT to corrupt the whole process.

Owen Gray said...

It appears that -- eventually -- we will have more than we will need, jrk. We have a moral obligation to release those stockpiles -- at no profit.

Owen Gray said...

Both witty and sly, jrk. We all research what at first looks interesting -- and then reject what we were originally interested in. It's better to have done the research than to buy a pig in a poke.

This is a blog I have not seen. It looks interesting.

Owen Gray said...

Profit is still a driving force in this situation, thwap. And it's profit that accounts for much of the inequity.

Gordie said...

Almost every day for the last month Trudeau has been saying that we are on track to vaccinate everybody in Canada who wants to be vaccinated.

Now, earlier this week I heard him talking about having a vaccine manufacturing facility up and running by December and another one by 2023. Furthermore, he was talking about having 240 million doses available next year. This messaging is inconsistent and it worries me. Are we going to need to get re-vaccinated every six months? What are we going to do with all these vaccine doses? Why do we need do many doses? What's going on here!

If we do have extra doses, I sure hope it goes to some less fortunate countries.

Owen Gray said...

It sounds like the manufacturing facility is about meeting future needs, Gordie, not present needs.

The Disaffected Lib said...

It has been argued, quite convincingly, that the response to Covid-19 tells us much about how our nations, our governments and their citizens are apt to respond to even greater crises that loom already in the chamber, locked and loaded.

Will Covid be a wakeup call or will we emerge from it exhausted, sapped of wealth, will and energy to prepare, proactively, for future challenges?

As Thwap points out, we responded to Covid reluctantly, always a day late and a dollar short, as it worsened. We were always just behind the power curve.

I have trouble with Mr. Pearson's linkage of the response to the pandemic and the failure of globalization/globalism. Globalism was never about equality of supply or access to products. It was about reducing costs and access to markets. Yet I find it hard to see how the global order of the neoliberal era can emerge intact from this disruption.

It was 2005 when John Ralston Saul's "The Collapse of Globalism" was published. It was a eulogy of an atrophied system based on a number of compelling arguments and yet, 15 years later, its heartbeat continues, its demise exaggerated. What emerges from Saul's analysis is that economic systems, all to some degree faith-based, linger until the "next great thing" comes along. In the case of globalism that has not emerged and we remain in the rut.

We're obviously unable to foresee the "next great thing" probably because, this time, it won't be of our own making. If anything, Covid has taught us that this "masters of all we survey" mantra of the postwar era is nonsense. In many respects from here on in we're just along for the ride and the road ahead is deeply rutted.

The Disaffected Lib said...

Gordie, there are those who contend we'll be dealing with Covid variants for years. One of them, British-born, Nobel laureate virologist, Michael Haughton thinks it is possible we may require ongoing booster shots every couple of years into the future. Haughton is currently at the University of Alberta.

The major vaccine producers, Pfizer and Moderna, as well as the newcomer, NovaVax, are already working on modified vaccines capable of thwarting these variants. The problem is that, so far, they're playing catch up.

Owen Gray said...

COVID is defeating us, Mound, because we know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

Owen Gray said...

That, in a nutshell, is the problem, Mound. We're playing catchup.