China leads the United States in diplomatic duel of vaccines in Latin America

Washington (AFP) – During the covid-19 pandemic, the United States donated many more vaccines to Latin America than China, but it did so “with less fanfare” and, according to the Atlantic Council center, there is a perception that the Asian colossus was “more proactive “.

China, which has been using its buoyant economy for politics for a decade, is the first or second largest trading partner for many countries in the region, and this diplomatic battle over vaccines gave it an additional opportunity to compete with the multidimensional relations of the United States with Latin America. and the Caribbean.

The United States has donated more than 61 million doses of vaccines to Latin America and the Caribbean bilaterally and through Covax, a multilateral mechanism created by the WHO.

China, for its part, has delivered some 10 million, according to the report “United States-China Vaccine Diplomacy: Lessons for Latin America and the Caribbean,” presented on Thursday by the US think tank Atlantic Council.

Despite this, “the general regional perception is that China is a more proactive and reliable pandemic partner than the United States,” he adds.

This is due to several factors, such as the number of doses that were given or sold bilaterally, that is, directly between countries.

The amount donated by Washington through Covax had less repercussion, while the Chinese government resorted to traditional diplomacy and ensured that donations and sales were accompanied by extensive media coverage.

In El Salvador, for example, Chinese vaccines once arrived on a chartered plane owned by the New England Patriots football team, attracting the press.

“US shipments, which arrived with less fanfare, were overlooked,” says the report, which focuses on four geographic areas: Central America, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil and Mexico.

The United States must be more geostrategically competitive and more committed, warns María Eugenia Brizuela de Ávila, former Salvadoran Minister of Foreign Affairs and co-author of the report.

Otherwise, it will pay a diplomatic price, as was seen with Nicaragua. Managua broke diplomatic relations with Taiwan in 2021, reestablished them with China and, just a week later, received 200,000 vaccines.

Honduras, Guatemala and Belize continue to recognize Taiwan, an ally of Washington, “but if they need to obtain vaccines in the future, perhaps they will change their foreign policy and recognize China,” warned Brizuela de Ávila at an Atlantic Council colloquium.

-China shows muscle-

The same is the opinion of Riyad Insanally, former ambassador of Guyana to the United States: Taiwan has seven embassies in Central America and the Caribbean and “China would like them all to disappear.”

Trinidad and Tobago and other Caribbean countries canvassed the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom for help, but “it was slow in coming and countries like China, Russia and India were offering vaccines…it was a missed opportunity.” for Washington, he says.

Brazil was less dependent on donations thanks to its ability to manufacture vaccines.

It had “three diplomatic channels: the federal government that negotiated with Astrazeneca (British-Swedish company), the authorities of the state of Sao Paulo that outlined the agreement with (the Chinese pharmaceutical company) Sinovac and the private sector”, with the collaboration between laboratories ( the Brazilian institute Butantan and Sinovac), explains Claudia Trevisan, director of the CBBC Brazil China Business Council.

It was a diplomacy less geopolitical and more practical and of medical urgency, he points out.

But Brazil is a big country, the small ones had to turn a disadvantage into an advantage.

Uruguay claims to have achieved it: “What was an inconvenience – being a small country – somehow became a judo key, because we turned that deficiency in market volume or attractiveness into an advantage”, assured the minister at the colloquium. Uruguayan Public Health, Daniel Salinas. And it is that with few doses the needs of an entire country could be satisfied.

Uruguay opted for “bilateral agreements” with both countries because “it was not a problem of one power or another, but of what situation we were in at that time,” he said.

Mexico took advantage of the dynamic between the United States and China. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador first asked the US government for help, but since it was slow to arrive, he turned to China, explains Bosco Martí, director of Institutional Affairs and Communications.

“Regional governments do not see China as a replacement for the United States – or vice versa – but as an additional or alternative source of external support,” the experts conclude.

© 2022 AFP

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