The Minister for Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation, José Manuel Albares, has reiterated Spain’s commitment to a supportive and multilateral response to the pandemic and to global vaccination goals at the ministerial meeting called by the Secretary of State of the United States, Antony Blinken, to analyse the priority Global Action Plan in the fight against COVID-19.
Spain has managed to combine vaccinating a high percentage of its own population with being one of the main vaccine donors. 90% of Spanish donations have been carried out through the COVAX mechanism, which we are the fifth largest contributor to, with more than 50 million doses shipped.
Spain is also the second leading vaccine donor in Latin America and has also distributed vaccines in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Southern Neighbourhood and Asia. Along the same line, access to vaccination has been facilitated in humanitarian contexts, as in the case of the recent operation to assist Afghan refugees in Iran. Minister Albares mentioned that “it is not only necessary to increase the distribution of vaccines, but also to strengthen national health systems”.
Spain offers its experience
The Minister for Foreign Affairs offered Spain’s leadership in coordinating the response from donors against COVID-19 in two lines of action: the fight against fake news and support for health workers, and in two geographic regions: Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Sahel.
These are two priority regions for Spanish Cooperation in which it already has significant experience, a broad deployment of institutions and where it works in close coordination with Team Europe, along with local counterparties, in accordance with the principle of ownership. To work in these two areas, Spain will also be able to count on the COVID-19 Global Health Programme recently launched by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (Spanish acronym: AECID) in 12 priority countries.
Lastly, Minister José Manuel Albares underlined the need for a reform of the global health governance system and to also reinforce the leadership of the World Health Organization to prevent future pandemics.
This meeting included the presence of the Foreign Affairs Ministers of Germany, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Colombia, South Korea, France, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Senegal, the European Commissioner for International Partnerships and representatives of the African Union and from the Foreign Affairs Ministries of Australia, India, the United Kingdom and South Africa.
This meeting, the second at a ministerial level, was decided on by the need to make a global, shared and coordinated effort to tackle the pandemic effectively.
The discussions were structured around the loopholes previously identified, grouped into six priority lines of action that comprise the Global Action Plan: to increase vaccination, to strengthen the resilience of the supply chain, to facilitate accurate and truthful information on vaccines, support for the safety and training of health workers, other non-vaccination therapeutic actions and reinforcing the global health architecture.
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Original press releases from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation in English and Spanish