Nations buying up covid-19 vaccine doses endanger pandemic efforts

By Graham Lawton

Akos Stiller/Bloomberg via Getty Images

During the flu pandemic of 2009, high-income nations were criticised for hoarding vaccine doses. Will “vaccine nationalism” raise its ugly head again?

Some world leaders seem to have learned the lessons of 2009, says Gavin Yamey at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. “There is clearly enormous political will that when vaccines are developed, rich countries don’t monopolise them,” he says. “We’ve heard world leaders like Emmanuel Macron saying that vaccines should be a ‘global public good’. That is significant because underlying …