The United States is set to send it’s first round of COVID-19 vaccines to Africa in the next several days. The first of these doses are being ordered to be sent to Djibouti, Ethiopia. Over 425,000 vaccinations are arriving and will eventually be dispersed between 49 different african countries, with the vast majority of these 49 countries being in the sub – saharan region of Africa. The vaccines being sent are Johnson & Johnson single dose shots, which means that citizens will not need multiple shots to be vaccinated against the disease. African officials have praised Biden and his administration for sending the vaccines, but have complained that the shots are not arriving fast enough to slow and/or prevent deadly outbreaks of COVID-19.
Africa shouldn’t be complaining when they’re getting aid from the entire rest of the world. They should accept what they’re given, for free, and not whine about them getting there on time because the doses not getting there at all is the much worse alternative. Africa needs to be careful that there isn’t any violent dispute over who gets how many vaccines, and who gets the vaccines first. Africa has a tendency to be very egotistical and they may be offended because of who receives the first couple rounds of vaccines. The United States also needs to be weary of a budget, helping Africa will help us maintain influence but with all the war going on that the United States seems to be very much involved in, in several regions, we can’t afford to fight another proxy war, nor should we.
In class we talk about how helping other regions and countries gives us the ability to maintain influence on these countries and regions. America helping nearly 50 countries in africa with medical aid, in the form of vaccines should net us a ton of potential influence and will help combat some of the work that our rival, China has been doing in terms of influence and diplomacy.