Riccardo Petrella*
“Science (and economics) for the health of the earth’s inhabitants.”
For a common, public, free worldwide coronavirus vaccine.
Proposal for a transnational alliance.
Humanity does not need any vaccine war. There is no valid reason for the future vaccine(s) to be privately owned by pharmaceutical companies. for at least 17 to 20 years.
As everyone knows, they manifestly operate with priority in the interests of the owners of their capital by producing and marketing (thanks to public subsidies and public regulations) medicines designed primarily to treat the sick who can pay the price set by the companies themselves.
Money continues to enslave health. It is not true that science and economy are at the service of the people. There are other recipients-masters before the people. The brief news below is, unfortunately, a painful confirmation of this. About a month ago, President Trump offered more than $1 billion to buy a small German company Cure-Vac, which specializes in vaccines and considered to be among the best positioned in the setor. The German Government intervened and Cure-Vac refused the offer. A few days later, the President of the European Commission, Germany’s former defense minister, announced the Commission’s allocation of €80 million to Cure-Vac in support of its research on the vaccine in the interests of the European Union ! Of all this, the French President Macron is the most indisposed because, as shown a few days ago in a televised speech, his objective is to support the French pharmaceutical industry, very powerful, in this fight for the conquest of the future multi-billions vaccine markets if the eco-nomy (“the rules of the house”) remains the current one.
Saturday, April 18, the Agora of the Earth’s inhabitants association active in various countries around the world (from Argentina to Belgium, from Chile to France, from Brazil to Cameroon, from Quebec to Italy, Portugal, Germany, ‘India …) has decided to launch the proposal for a transnational campaign whose objective is to adopt a worldwide protocol on a common public patent on the coronavirus vaccine.
To this end, it is proposed that the campaign be conceived, planned and piloted by a worldwide network of civil society associations, movements and institutions to be set up.
The multiplicity and diversity of initiatives in this field is fundamental and desirable. So are the continental, global and strong alliances. The “national ways” and the “parochial ways” (especially of corporate and/or ideological interest) are not enough.
The important thing is to avoid that Covid-19 pandemic vaccine(s) will yet be another act of economic, social and political expropriation of life by strong private powers with the support of national and international public authorities.
Science must cease to be an instrument used above all in the service of war, power and inequality. Knowledge is a “res publica” thanks to which the right, responsible, “rich”, joyful, free, peaceful and fraternal human communities are built.
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*Riccardo Petrella (La Spezia, Italy, August 5,
1941) – Founder of the International Committee for the World Water Contract,
Prof. Emeritus of Globalisation at the Catholic University of Louvain and member
of The WPF’s Scientific Committee, Italy. Article sent to Other News by the
author on April 22, 2020.
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