Dengue fever, cholera: we are there on these two fronts good news coming for vaccinations. Treatments and prophylaxis never arrive as quickly as one would like, but medical science continues to reap successes. Since these diseases disproportionately affect the Global South, while vaccines are discovered, developed and produced mostly in rich and advanced countries, the widespread narrative describes a West selfish and greedy capitalist, who does not share the benefits of his health progress.
It is a false legend, the exact opposite of what has been happening for centuries, and continues into the present time: the West discovers vaccines and treatments that save lives in the poorest countries. This is what will happen in the coming years also for dengue and cholera.
Dengue fever, like malaria, comes spread by mosquitoes. It has recently had a resurgence in South America, with epicenters in Brazil and Peru. In other parts of the world, Bangladesh is one of the most affected countries, recording three hundred thousand cases in 2023. It is also called “the fever that breaks the bones” for the type of acute pain that afflicts the joints. A majority of cases stop at the mild stage of the disease, which resembles the flu. 5% of patients are affected by the most acute form, which can cause serious complications, the arrest of vital organ functions, till death. Vaccines have existed for years but have limitations. One requires two doses and is expensive, another can only be used on those who are already infected.
Luckily it is a new vaccine is coming. It was created by scientists of the National Institutes of Health in the United States. And it has already been licensed for production to a large Brazilian public body, theButantan Institute of Sao Paulo. The Brazilian body will be able to manufacture tens of millions of doses starting next year. These will be distributed within Brazil. The American multinational will take care of the rest of the world Merckalso a recipient of the National Institutes of Health discovery license.
A parallel vaccine is the Qdenga of the Japanese house Takeda. It is expensive but it was licensed to an Indian pharmaceutical company (Biological E) for large-scale production, up to 50 million doses per year. This will allow much lower prices to be charged for purchases by the Brazilian government.
The cholera it is an even more widespread disease, only at the beginning of 2024 were major outbreaks reported in 17 countries. Cholera kills through dehydration, caused when the body tries to expel the virulent bacterium through vomiting and liquid diarrhea. Vaccines exist, the problem is to raise their production to the level of demand. A campaign to increase production was launched byInternational Vaccine Institute, a UN body. Production has been concentrated in the South Korean pharmaceutical company for a few years EuBiologics which has committed to reaching 46 million doses in 2024 and a double quantity in 2025.
Other companies are preparing to take over with licensed productions, including the Indian one Biological E. A South African pharmaceutical company, Biovacis conducting clinical trials on first anti-cholera vaccine developed in sub-Saharan Africa. Coordinating the production and distribution efforts in the Great South is theGavi association (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation), the global alliance for the distribution of vaccines in poor countries. Gavi was born in the year 2000 on the initiative of Bill Gates and since then helped immunize approximately 800 million children. Who are its main financiers? In first place comes the United Kingdom, in second place the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in third place the United States. Followed by Norway, Germany, France and Canada.
Nowhere in these vaccination campaigns do countries like China, Russia, Cubawhich we usually associate with “medicine for the poor” offered to the global Great South. Beijing, Moscow and Havana have been able to use theirs in the past health aid for propaganda purposes, to the point of giving the impression of being the true benefactors of poor humanity. Some attempts were also seen during the Covid pandemic. The truth is that their impact is negligible, sometimes negative (see i Chinese and Russian Covid vaccines flop). The great progress in the health conditions of poor countries originated in the West, or in countries that long ago converted to the Western model (such as Japan and South Korea).
Yet the “evil legend” about the selfish and avaricious West continues. The Gavi association, for example, was repeatedly criticized by humanitarian NGOs, including Doctors Without Borders. Receiving funding from capitalists Bill and Melinda Gates is an unforgivable sin. Anti-Western ideology blinds many and prevents them from seeing clearly. A special taboo surrounds the medical excellence of South Africa, an unsaid, an inconvenient because politically incorrect truth: that pharmaceutical jewel that is the company Biovacthe only one in Africa to discover new vaccines instead of producing under American license, it is a consequence of the legacy of white, racist and segregationist South Africa, which equipped itself with world-leading universities and he had precursors such as the surgeon Chris Barnard in heart transplants. This does not take away anything from the condemnation that history has inflicted on the apartheid regime, it does not attenuate our severe moral judgment on that aberration; the fact remains that even the South Africa today governed by the African National Congress, heir to Nelson Mandela, enjoys the benefits of a white, Western heritage in the medical field.
Dengue and cholera are just a few examples that contradict the evil legend about the selfish West. The fight againstHIV-AIDS and another. HIV infections and AIDS deaths have been steadily decreasing for years. Experts now consider it realistic to achieve the historic objective of completely eradicate this plague. Who would have thought it, when in the 1980s he was carrying out a massacre? Success came with the so-called “antiretroviral” therapies, developed in the United States and Europe. But these treatments were quickly distributed even in the poorest countries, particularly in Africa where the incidence of the disease was high.
What slowed down the progress of this campaign in Africa were some local resistance, political and ideological, not the selfishness of the West. Once the obstacles have been overcome, today countries like Botswana, Rwanda, Tanzania and Zimbabwe have achieved the “95-95-95” objectives set by the UN in 2023: 95% of infected patients have been correctly diagnosed, 95% of those suffering from HIV are subjected to life-saving antiretroviral treatments, and 95% of patients who receive these therapies reach the goal of eliminating the virus.
A part of the Global South, when it has to take sides on major geopolitical issues, today tends to take anti-Western, pro-Chinese or pro-Russian positions. Some of its best-known leaders, such as the Brazilian president Lulathey handle it with enthusiasm anti-American rhetoric. But for what really matters, such as the health of his fellow citizens, Lula also depends on Western science, on Western pharmaceutical capitalism, on Western generosity.
