Refugee Populations Neglected In Global Vaccine Allocation
UNHCR
As global disbursement of the Covid-19 vaccination commences, regional inequities expose a chronically neglected population— refugees. Today, 86% of the world’s refugee populations are hosted by low- and middle-income nations, the very same countries which have been an afterthought in the global allocation of vaccinations to the novel coronavirus. In these regions of fragility and conflict, Covid-19 has only served to exacerbate existing social and economic inequities, letting over 115 million people fall into poverty in 2020 alone. Coupled with the fact that the hardest hit low-income nations have been the last to receive vaccines, those remedies may not be finding themselves in the hands of displaced refugee populations without complication, if at all.
The primary concern with vaccinating displaced and refugee populations is simply if they will receive vaccinations, and if so, which national governments will take the responsibility to administer them. According to the UN Refugee Agency, a few countries, like Jordan, have begun vaccinating their first refugees, with other following suit. But, the allocations are “very much dependent on national plans” explains Sajjad Malik, Director of the UNHCR’s Division for Resilience and Solutions. While the UNHCR has continually advocated for internally displaced people and stateless people to be included in each country’s vaccination plans, that inclusion is complicated when most refugees aren’t reflected in national statistics & metrics off which vaccination plans are devised. Overlooking these populations, states Malik, endangers these nations’ public health as “there’s a segment of the population which will be at risk, and they can put others at risk” if they are not properly vaccinated.
However, even when national governments take the initiative to include their refugee populations in vaccination plans, they must be allocated sufficient supplies in the first place to be able to administer them. According to the UNHCR, we haven’t yet seen a steady flow of vaccine supplies to those countries which host a majority of displaced populations. Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, explained that Uganda wasn’t able to administer its first vaccine until March 10th, just a day before President Biden announced that all adults in the United States would be eligible for vaccines by May 1. Thus, richer Western nations are having their populations vaccinated at much higher rates in comparison to their counterparts, further complicating the distribution of vaccines to refugee populations. Because countries like Uganda have received supplies later and in lower quantities, it’s become more difficult to reach and vaccinate the displaced populations within their borders.
So, what exactly are the risks and consequences if refugee populations aren’t included in vaccine rollouts? According to the UNHCR, a minimum of 70% of any national population must be vaccinated to break or sustainably slow the spread of the virus and reach immunity. As a result, “excluding refugees, other displaced people or non-nationals from vaccination plans carries the risk of ongoing transmission in these populations, with spillovers into the national population,” hampering national immunity efforts. According to Grandi, neglecting these populations is simply shortsighted, and will backfire on a global scale as collective immunity relies on vaccinating all of our global populations, especially those who have been historically marginalized.
Key solutions to rectifying these disparities in worldwide vaccine distributions, he adds, must factor refugee populations into supply allocations. Uganda, for instance, hosts 1.5 million refugees in addition to its national population of 40-50 million nationals. “These additional burdens have to be considered,” explains Grandi, in order to ensure that countries that host refugees receive appropriate vaccine supplies. Accordingly, the UNHCR is now working to advocate for increased packages from the World Bank, IMF, and WHO by factoring in how many vulnerable, displaced populations are present in those nations. Looking ahead, we can only hope that taking the needs of displaced populations into account will help to make global vaccine distributions more equitable and accelerated.