Middle-East Arab News and Opinion - Asharq Al-Awsat is the world’s premier pan-Arab daily newspaper, printed simultaneously each day on four continents in 14 cities
An additional challenge this time around is the space race-type international competition in vaccine development. China and Russia are promoting inoculations with little or no data validating their effectiveness in large studies. India has licensed an indigenous product developed by local firm Bharat Biotech International Ltd. “in clinical trial mode”.
Policy makers in developing nations may not have a choice but to take what they can get cheaply and quickly. But in so doing, they might just be storing up legal troubles for later.
Who s on the hook if Covid vaccines go wrong?
On current estimates, Covax can meet only a fifth of global demand by the end of the year.
(AP)
Anjani Trivedi,
, Bloomberg
Given the breakneck pace of production, there are very few answers about what manufacturers and governments are ultimately responsible for
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The Covid-19 vaccines are here and distribution has begun. But what if something goes wrong?
Whether it’s a loss of income, hefty medical bills or other serious adverse effects from getting a shot, someone has to pick up the tab, be it vaccine manufacturers or governments. In the past, so-called liability shields have given companies cover to produce effective treatments quickly without legal exposure. But it’s a risky endeavor for countries to absorb full responsibility for highly novel products, developed and licensed at lightning speed. Especially when every man, woman and, eventually, child will need to be injected.
More States Find Variant; N.Y. Cases Reach Record: Virus Update Bloomberg 1/7/2021 Bloomberg News
(Bloomberg) Connecticut, Texas and Pennsylvania reported their first cases of the virus variant that helped trigger a U.K. lockdown amid concern that Covid-19 deaths in the U.S. are likely to maintain a near-record pace at least through January. Mounting hospitalizations are offsetting any positive effect from the halting start to inoculations.
New York, New Jersey, Florida and North Carolina are among states that reported daily records as Illinois became the fifth state to surpass 1 million infections. Fatalities in Arizona reached a high and those in California were just two deaths from the record set at the end of 2020.