MEDICC Review: US Sanctions on Cuba Imperil Global Vaccine Equity

OAKLAND, Calif., Aug. 24, 2021 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- With COVID-19 vaccination rates hovering at just over 1% in low-income countries and Cuban development of at least two efficacious vaccines, MEDICC Review editors argue that tightened US sanctions on Cuba also take aim at the world's poorest nations in Africa and elsewhere.

"Given the track record of Cuban biotechnology and the export potential for the new vaccines, it becomes clear that a US policy intended to hobble the Cuban government actually takes aim at the world's poorer countries, which could stand to benefit from Cuban science to address the dearth of life-saving vaccines for their populations," write MEDICC Review editors in the new issue, published today.

The editorial team, headed by Dr. C. William Keck and Gail Reed, notes that several governments in Latin America, Asia and Africa have expressed interest in the Cuban vaccines, two of which have completed clinical trials in Cuba: Abdala (reporting 92% efficacy) and Soberana 02 (91% efficacy), the first receiving emergency use authorization on July 9 by the country's regulatory authority. However, editors of the peer-reviewed journal cite Cuban vaccine developers who say that US sanctions have hindered and even blocked "purchase of dozens of equipment, supplies and ingredients for clinical trials and production?reagents, filtration tanks, potassium chloride solution, purification systems and more."

Such continued punishment, says the editorial, "is reprehensible. It is inhumane. It is also, in the context of COVID-19, lethal."

The editorial suggests that the Biden administration lift US sanctions on all pandemic-response items such as medicines and medical devices, a move it already made for Iran, Syria and Venezuela last June, but not for Cuba.

Otherwise, note the editors, "calls by President Biden for vaccine equity, human rights, regional stability and integration, and easing Cubans' suffering all ring hollow while his White House champions punishment during a pandemic...These sanctions-on-steroids aren't just bad public health policy, they are bad statesmanship."

The new MEDICC Review issue also carries an exclusive interview with the Director of the Cuban Regulatory Authority, CECMED, and content on COVID-19: pandemic response in Rwanda, South Africa and Zimbabwe; managing hypoxemia to prevent cytokine storms; and emergence of other zoonoses in times of COVID-19.

PLUS:
-More Accurately Estimating Iron-deficiency Anemia in Cuban Children
-Enhanced Recovery Protocols in Cardiac Surgery
-Improving Diagnosis of Ketosis-Prone Type 2 in Africa
-Novel Cuban Monoclonal Antibody Treatment for Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

https://mediccreview.org

Media Contact

Jerrontay Foster, MEDICC, 6789048092, [email protected]

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SOURCE MEDICC