Nationally and internationally, the COVID-19 pandemic is revealing and intensifying the inequalities between rich and poor. The virus is the same, but that is how far the equality extends.

Different access to private spaces, safe work environments, health care, economic support and vaccine are not only revealing existing inequalities around the world but also intensifying them.

Local inequalities

Nationally, there are inequalities depending on if you are able to transition your work online, working from home or if you have to continue working outside of your home, increasing the risk of infection dramatically. Many people able to work from anywhere have, while schools are closed, escaped cities for vacation houses with more open spaces.

Many have also lost their jobs altogether during this time. Although Australia has rolled out some extensive economic support packages such as the JobSeeker and JobKeeper, there are still those that found themselves without backing, such as non-citizens with casual, short-term employments. These payments have decreased substantially in the last few months, although many industries have yet to recover.

International disparities

However, the main inequalities can be found internationally. The effects are not limited to peoples’ health and access to medical treatment, the effects on people’s economic stability and food safety have been huge as lockdowns and other preventative measures have led to loss of employment and other sources of income.  

In India, for example, the country with the second most infections after the US, the pandemic has caused severe suffering. A sudden and strict lockdown in March left tens of thousands of migrant workers stuck, trying to get out of the city by foot in search for work. Millions of infections around the country meant that hospitals were (and are) strained well over capacity and had to turn patients away to their deaths. The pandemic also intensified Islamophobia as Muslims were blamed for the fast spread of the virus, unemployment and hunger.

The virus hit all economies hard and around the world lockdowns led to extreme hunger and poverty. Some countries were worse equipped to deal with these unprecedented events. Countries around Asia, South America and Africa saw a sharp increase in people living in extreme poverty and hunger. Colombian households struggling in lockdown waved red flags in their windows, a cry for help and donations from passers-by.

The latest State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report estimates that in 2019, 690 million people suffered from severe, chronic hunger. This number has increased by approximately 60 million in the last five years. Exact numbers are impossible to obtain, but the same report predicts that the pandemic might have brought another 130 million people into chronic hunger by the end of last year.

Access to vaccine

Whenever the COVID-19 vaccine is brought up among people at social gatherings I attend, I hear people say that: “I’d rather not be among the first to take it.” Granted, these are people that are not in risk groups and that hence tend to not fear the virus for themselves. In Australia we are partially sheltered from the devastating harms and deaths caused by the virus, as one of few countries that have managed to keep the virus at bay. People are therefore more concerned with the rush under which the virus has been developed and potential consequences of the vaccine, rather than the virus itself.

Due to the low levels of Corona cases in Australia, we are in a quite unique position to hold off on vaccines, to see how the vaccines fairs in other countries. This is a luxurious position to be in, while other nations are scrambling to use the vaccines to help curtail the rapid spread of the virus.

Meanwhile, many poorer countries are at risk of delayed access to vaccine. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organisation (WHO) cautions that the unequal distribution of the vaccine to poorer countries is leading to a ‘catastrophic moral failure’. Richer countries are buying up available vaccines, leaving the poorer in danger of missing out. This, Tedros says, will extend the life of the pandemic.

Extended inequalities

The inequalities between countries have never been more apparent than during this global pandemic. Yet, the pandemic is far from over, and the aftermaths are yet to be fully appreciated. Apart from the previously named inequalities and manners in which the pandemic has extended these, delaying the distribution of vaccine to poorer countries, will continue to magnify socioeconomic and health inequalities between rich and poor.

The WHO is calling for wealthier countries to support Covax, a vaccine-distribution scheme aimed at providing equitable access to vaccine for all countries. For Covax to be successful, wealthier nations need to stop making separate bilateral deals which put them ahead of vulnerable populations in poorer countries. More than that, these rising inequalities require further commitments on part of wealthier nations to support other countries to deal with the pandemic and its aftermaths, to minimise poverty, suffering and harm.