President Ilham Aliyev has condemned what he described as “vaccine nationalism” and unequal access to vaccines in the world.
Addressing the online 74th session of World Health Assembly (WHA) on May 30, Aliyev urged developed countries and international donor organizations to help developing, in particular least developed countries to access COVID-19 vaccines.
Stressing that over 82 percent of the world’s vaccine doses have been purchased by wealthy countries, while only 0.3 percent have gone to low-income countries, Aliyev said that “some countries purchase several times more vaccines than their actual needs and deprive developing countries from protecting their populations.” Furthermore, he spoke about Azerbaijan’s role in global fight against the pandemic, reminding that his country contributed 10 million dollars to the World Health Organization and provided humanitarian and financial assistance to over 30 countries over coronavirus.
The president noted that Azerbaijan, as the chair of the Non-Aligned Movement, has initiated a number of global initiatives, in particular the holding of the Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in May 2020, and convening the Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly at the level of the heads of state and government in December 2020 which was supported by more than 150 States. As to the domestic measures taken against COVID-19, the president said Azerbaijan has so far built 13 modular hospitals and a regular hospital since the outbreak of the pandemic, with the total number of beds designated to treat COVID patients exceeding 10 000.
The government has also introduced the socio-economic stimulus package worth almost $2 billion to support COVID-affected people and business, he said. Aliyev said that 10 percent of the Azerbaijan’s ten million population have received vaccine jabs in the nationwide vaccination process since mid-January using 99.94 % “Sinovac” vaccines and the rest AstraZeneca and Sputnik vaccines. It should be noted that Azerbaijan is the first country in the South Caucasus and Central Asia regions to introduce nationwide vaccination. The vaccination is free and voluntary.
World Health Assembly (WHA) is the decision-making body of the World Health Organization’s (WHOs).
