This event is for Chatham House members only.

While the global coronavirus pandemic is killing millions, decimating economies and rapidly increasing poverty, relations between major powers are deteriorating. Despite global rhetoric for international cooperation, many countries saw the pandemic as an opportunity for nationalist point-scoring and repatriated their assets. Tedros Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), has likened the situation to ‘vaccine apartheid’ while experts have warned that COVID-19 is only a test for what is to come: further global health crises and the impending climate emergency.

In this event, Chatham House experts discuss the geo-strategic rivalries between democracies and authoritarian states. In an era of extreme competition, bordering confrontation, what can be done to harness cooperation that all the main countries say is vital to manage the pandemic? How can the United States and China, for example, put their differences aside and focus on the global supply of vaccines? How will China and Russia capitalize on the deals they have brokered with states in the Global South in need of vaccines? And is Covax the ‘only truly global solution’ to equitably distribute vaccines around the world?