Covid-19 vaccine nationalism harmful for all, says WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus

Despite the growing number of vaccine options, current manufacturing capacity meets only a fraction of global need, he said

World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Credit: Reuters Photo

Covid-19 vaccine nationalism is harmful for all, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Tuesday, and said weak cooperation between nations is a major barrier to achieving worldwide vaccination at the scale needed to end the coronavirus pandemic.

"Despite the growing number of vaccine options, current manufacturing capacity meets only a fraction of global need," the WHO director-general said in a piece published in Foreign Policy magazine.

"Allowing the majority of the world's population to go unvaccinated will not only perpetuate needless illness and deaths and the pain of ongoing lockdowns, but also spawn new virus mutations as Covid-19 continues to spread among unprotected populations," he wrote