>> The United States has decided to isolate
itself from the global fight for a coronavirus
vaccine, with the Trump administration arguing
that it doesn't want to be constrained by
the World Health Organization, and by multilateral
groups that are working together. We're talking
about hundreds of countries to combat this
virus, which doesn't really understand or
care about borders, for instance.
So the US pulled out of the World Health Organization
in early July, and we're already seeing some
of the consequences of that. As the Associated
Press reports some nations have worked directly
to secure supplies of vaccine, but others
are pooling efforts to ensure success against
a disease that has no geographical boundaries,
more than 150 countries are setting up the
COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility,
also known as COVAX.
So the cooperative effort linked with the
World Health Organization would allow nations
to take advantage of a portfolio of potential
vaccines to ensure their citizens are quickly
covered by whichever ones are deemed effective.
The World Health Organization says even government's
making deals with individual vaccine makers
would benefit from joining COVAX because it
would provide backup vaccines in case the
ones being made through bilateral deals with
manufacturers aren't successful.
And as representative Amy Barrow says, and
she is a medical professional joining COVAX
is a simple measure to guarantee us access
to a vaccine, no matter who develops it first.
This go it alone approach leaves America at
risk of not getting a vaccine. And listen
if Donald Trump did a decent job in responding
to this pandemic, and we saw the effectiveness
of his approach, then maybe there would be
a little bit of maybe a little bit of trust
toward what he's doing and pulling out of
the World Health Organization.
But this country has been honestly a unique
failure when you consider the resources we
have in responding to this crisis, so let's
take a look at Trump's failure gap. That is
the difference between the United States and
the European Union when it comes to the the
number of COVID deaths and cases.
So as you can see, in July, that gap was much,
much bigger but even now, I mean when you
take a look at this. On the August 23, numbers,
the updates, it shows that the United States
is ebbing, but it's still three times the
second wave experienced by the EU like we've
been such failures of this.
If you look at the specific numbers in the
United States pertaining to the Coronavirus,
we have 6.09 million confirmed cases. And
we already have 185,000 deaths. And if you
look at the number of deaths per capita in
the United States is pretty high up there
in that list.
You have Peru, Chile and Brazil, as the top
three and again, these are deaths per 100,000
people.
>> The United States though is fourth, and
that does not look good again when you consider
the wealth and the resources we have in this
country, and how Donald Trump managed to screw
this up so much.
>> Yeah, yeah and not joining that international
compact would be a bad strategy if your goal
was to get access to reliable supplies of
a safe tested vaccine when it becomes available
and it's tested to the extent that multiple
countries would give comfortable giving it
to its citizens.
If that was your goal then not joining this
would seem to be a bad thing for you. Arguably,
they have a different goal because I mean,
I'm sure many people have seen we were talking
about during one of the breaks. They've already
sent out messages from the CDC, to state governors
telling them to change whatever regulations
and rules are necessary to prepare for distribution
of the vaccine in late October or by November
1.
Is that because there's been huge advances
that we're hearing about that we're right
on the cusp of getting a safe vaccine? No,
not at all, but they're getting ready to make
a big announcement, and whether the vaccine
is safe or was tested, or they actually have
a deal to purchase it, or they actually can
get the supplies necessary to spread it, that's
all an interesting question.
But they're definitely going to announce it
no matter what.
>> Yeah, that's such a great point. And then
they're planning on doing it close to November,
I wonder why.
