We are a strange species. We are able to produce marvels, but then fail to ensure they reach everybody who would benefit, even though the costs would be trivial against the gains to all. The marvel now is the swift arrival of effective vaccines against Covid-19. The failure is to ensure production and distribution at sufficient scale. In our folly, we are throwing away a glorious opportunity.
In “A Proposal to End the Covid-19 Pandemic”, Ruchir Agarwal and Gita Gopinath of the IMF have illuminated both the opportunity and the benefits from seizing it. Their suggested plan is to vaccinate at least 40 per cent of the population of all countries by the end of 2021 and at least 60 per cent by July 2022, as well as enabling widespread testing and tracing. The study estimates the cumulative economic benefits at $9tn ($1,150 per person) against a cost of $50bn — a ratio of 180 to one. This must be among the highest-return investments ever.
This pandemic is, above all, a health crisis. But it is also an economic disaster. The report is right to insist that “pandemic policy is also economic policy as there is no durable end to the economic crisis without an end to the health crisis.” A comparison of the IMF’s forecasts of October 2019 with those for April 2021 suggests that Covid-19 lowered global real output by $16tn (at 2019 prices) in 2020 and 2021 alone. If the pandemic continues, such losses will cumulate far into the future.