Letters to the Editor: Avoid divide of rich and poor over vaccine

Scientists warn that such disparities will not only haunt poorer countries but will also affect rich ones, as the continued spread of the virus will allow it to mutate in ways that undermine vaccines for years to come.

The toll in Africa could be especially profound. Although the continent has 17% of the world’s people, so far it has administered just 2% of the vaccine doses given globally.

Kenya, with one of Africa’s more prosperous economies, estimates that it will inoculate only 30% of its 50m people by 2023.

The World Health Organization (WHO) reported last week that the second wave of Covid-19, which began at the end of 2020, has hit African countries more aggressively, with a 30% rise in infections compared to the first wave.

In Kenya, positivity rates are over 20%, with 123,000 total reported cases, and 14,000 new cases this month alone.

Although Africa showed some resilience to the disease during last year’s first phase, the WHO warns that rising cases threaten fragile healthcare systems in the region.

Healthcare workers are currently bearing the brunt of the pandemic in Africa, with an average of 267 African health workers being infected every day, the WHO report.

Most African countries are relying on COVAX, the global mechanism for procuring and distributing vaccines. Last month, the Irish government announced an additional €5m in spending on the global health response to Covid-19, with most of that funding going to COVAX.

But with COVAX projecting that it will inoculate just 20% of Africa’s population this year, there is a long road ahead if we are to avoid a devastating split between “us and them”, with
the consequent undermining of the global effort to bring the pandemic under control.

Ray Jordan

CEO, Self Help Africa

Parkgate St

Dublin 8

Gesture politics

It was magnanimous of Arlene Foster to offer non-existing stocks of Covid-19 vaccines to her southern brethren.

What next, an imaginary border poll?

Liam Power

Dundalk

Co Louth

No Dáil future for divided Green TDs

Mick Clifford’s article ‘Green divisions not helping the planet’ (Irish Examiner, March 27) may have been a far too polite assessment of where the Green Party is at present.

If there was any doubt that the majority of those who voted for the party last time out were duped, that was dispelled by the performance of the Green’s deputy leader Catherine Martin on RTÉ’s The Week in Politics on Sunday (March 28).

During the entire programme, Ms Martin had nothing of any substance to say on the key issues of the day.

Not a word was uttered on the glaring deprivations and injustices many continue to face — such as the housing crisis which Ms Martin claimed during the election was her “top priority”.

I predict that after the next election there will not be a single Green TD in the Dáil — and that outcome will do the planet, and those who occupy this tiny portion of it, no harm whatever.

Jim O’Sullivan

Rathedmond

Sligo

Celebrate Easter in a true show of faith

Celebrate Easter in a true show of faith

The truth of the Easter resurrection is every bit as real for Christians in the humblest living room as in the grandest cathedral.

An intelligent modern expression of faith should be rooted in reason and evidence because Ireland needs much less clericalism and many fewer church buildings.

Does the stainless steel spire on the Church of Ireland Belfast Cathedral, allegedly costing £852 000, represent value for money?

Calls to open up churches may leave vulnerable elderly clerics or church attenders at risk.

Why not miss or delay Easter worship if this reduces the risk to human health?

Believers are assured of Christ’s perpetual presence, absolutely everywhere, in the saviour’s own words: “And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

James Hardy

Belfast

Stations of the Cross on YouTube

I am aware that for many people there will not be an opportunity to gather to celebrate Holy Week and Easter in their local parish church.

This is the second year in which church buildings remain closed to gathering of groups for worship.

For a while, I was just giving out about it but then it struck me that instead of “giving out” — a pointless activity — I should and could do something which might be of help to people.

I have written a set of ‘Stations of the Cross for 2021’ for Good Friday which are available on YouTube on the following link: https://youtu.be/CuJwIH8_Ixk.

The Stations are not traditional but they do incorporate tradition and new text.

Each station is voiced by a different person from as far away as Tokyo/Toronto and as close as Clonakilty/Bantry and Timoleague.

They should be thought-provoking and hopefully draw us together as we pray.

Fr Ger Galvin

Timoleague

Bandon

Co Cork

Myanmar needs UN intervention

Your account of cruel violence perpetrated by the Tatmadaw against its own people — ‘Myanmar protests continue after more than 100 killed in the bloodiest day since coup’ (Irish Examiner, online, March 28) — is blood-chilling in the extreme. What, if anything, can the international community do about it?

The conventional answer is basically nothing, as governments are sovereign within their own territory. As the Chinese professor Shen Dingli of Shanghai stated about an earlier Myanmar civil protest: “China has used tanks to kill people on Tiananmen Square. It is Myanmar’s sovereign right to kill their own people too.”

In the case of Myanmar, the UN Security Council has made statements of “serious concern”. However, it is also incumbent upon it to hold perpetrators to account.

It is open to the General Assembly to invoke an intervention known as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) passed in the UN General Assembly World Summit 2005 (Res.A/RES/60/1).

In the event of an individual state failing “to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, war crimes and crimes against humanity” then the General Assembly, through the Security Council, of which Ireland is a member, should be “prepared to take collective action”.

The logical consequence of this remit is that the Security Council must urgently refer the situation to the International Criminal Court, impose, without further delay, a far-reaching global arms embargo and targeted financial sanctions on senior military officials responsible for atrocity crimes.

Individual states, including Ireland, could then mirror these sanctions. The involvement of ASEAN would be indispensable and indeed the credibility of that organisation might well rest upon its response to the Myanmar crisis.

Joseph Mullen

Former UN Adviser to Burma, Vietnam and Cambodia

Ballina

Co Mayo

Ireland must take a stand for Myanmar

I am deeply disturbed by events in Myanmar. The youngest and bravest are being murdered by a self-appointed, unelected government.

Ireland lobbied hard to get a seat on the UN Security Council. Now is the hour for us to prove that we are worthy of a place on it, and for us to show that, given our history, we have fellow-feeling at this time for the ordinary citizens of Myanmar, and are prepared to do something about it.

It is time for Ireland to stand up and be counted at the UN. It is time for us to propose intervention by a UN force to prevent the shedding of more innocent blood in Myanmar. If not, how long does the UN need to wait?

Much more than a UN resolution is needed.

The people of Myanmar are waiting for the international community to help them. We are that community.

Michael N Brennan

Earls Court

Waterford

Harsh generalisation

I refer to: ‘Suzanne Harrington: Not all men? Yes, actually, all men are part of the problem’ (Irish Examiner, online March 24).

It is no more appropriate to say with respect to violence against women that “all men are part of the problem” than it would be to say in other contexts that “all Muslims are ...” or “all Africans are ... “ or “all people over 65 are ...”

Generalisations about behaviour based on age, race, sex, or religion are harmful and wrong.

Patrick Purcell

Odenton

Maryland

USA