Submit your Article

Any rational discourse around vaccines is impossible because the Americans have decided—and put an enormous amount of media attention—on creating the anti-vaxxer. This individual is always irrational, motivated not by science but by propaganda, and hysterical in their response to vaccines. They reject all vaccines not on the basis of rational evidence, but an intrinsic notion that vaccines are malefic.

Americans of course love to reject the grasp of the authoritarian state and any restrictions on personal freedom and choice, which is why they’re averse to both masks and vaccines, in equal measure.

This creates an added problem when individuals outside America try to debate the merits and demerits of vaccines. Americans assume everyone is a default American and we all think the same way. This, however, is not true, although it might not be apparent to the average liberal American who reads the New York Times and rants against anti-vaxxers.

I come from Nepal where everyone gets vaccinated and wears masks. But I still have questions about vaccines.

Let’s take the Covid-19 vaccine, rapidly being developed by Russia, China, UK, US, India, and myriad other countries. There’s a race to be the first country to create it, in the same way nations raced to get to space.

Because of Bill Gates and GAVI, the idea that a vaccine will cure this pandemic is seen to be the only answer. Gates cunningly managed to get $9 billion, from rich and poor nations, for his vaccine solution. The last interview of Mr. Gates, adoringly presented by some big media houses, showed him talking about how at least one among the six or seven vaccines being developed should work. It was unclear whether he thought people should take them simultaneously, or one after the other.   

Will the vaccine cure the pandemic? In Italy, large number of elderly people died in February and March 2020. One factor that stands out is the quadrivalent flu vaccine the Italian government provided for free to all citizens. “Quadrivalent” refers to the vaccine’s ability to suppress four types of flu virus strains. Elders over 65 were encouraged to get themselves vaccinated. The new vaccine was thought to be cost effective at 6 euros for a shot, cutting down the cost of hospitalization for pneumonia and bronchitis.

Yet despite the vaccinations, according to an article “Investigating the impact of influenza on excess mortality in all ages in Italy during recent seasons (2013/14–2016/17 seasons)” published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases, Italy had a higher prevalence of influenza deaths than other European countries.

“Italy showed a higher influenza attributable excess mortality compared to other European countries, especially in the elderly.”

Quadrivalent vaccines are cell-based. They are grown inside mammalian cells, instead of inside chicken eggs. So already we have an added complication here in which we have to trust the vaccine makers not to make a mistake with microscopic cells. These are not the simple vaccines of the past. This is a whole new and unknown biological apparatus in which multiple factors could go wrong.

Italy’s hundreds of coronavirus deaths among the elderly (9 percent mortality rate) may have been triggered by the quadrivalent vaccine, which suppressed their immune response to coronavirus. A small cold boosts immunity by building up the immune response. When people are shielded and show no response to the viruses of everyday, any new viral infection can bring down the house.

Are vaccines always safe? Italy suspended two batches of a Fluad flu vaccine made by Swiss firm Novartis after four people died shortly after receiving the drug, according to BBC. TIME magazine reports 11 deaths. Vaccine safety is never guaranteed. 

As science has become more complicated and opaque, so has disease. The Covid-19, for instance, seems to have a link with a bat virus which scientists in China were collecting from bats in caves. For some inexplicable reason, scientists then spliced these viruses into human cells to see if they would spread respiratory diseases. The fact a pandemic followed soon after is vociferously rejected by Chinese scientists as having any link with their research. But rationally we can assume there might be a connection between bats, artificial insertion of virus into human cells, and subsequent pandemic. This research was conducted with US government funds going to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, via American NGO EcoHealth Alliance.

So why is this pumped up version of genetically modified science, which glorifies the minute workings of the microscopic cell, the in-thing right now? Why is it getting all the funding? Why is there no ethical review of its potential harmful impacts? Is it because it gives an added measure of power to scientists by working with phenomena that ordinary people can’t see and understand?

Is the vaccine, created in troubling, opaque ways, and which in the past has shown to cause large number of deaths in Italy’s elderly, still the answer? Or are we pursuing this in the mistaken belief that science is supreme and we must follow its logic above all else?

The coronavius is a multi-headed hydra that requires careful, rational response from governments, policymakers, anthropologists, nutritionists, and traditional healers, among others. We can’t leave this at the hands of one man whose main qualification is selling the world a lot of clunky, soon-to-be-obsolete software.

The United Nations came into being after the horrors of the two world wars. The formation of this global institution, it was hoped, would nip the emergent inter-state problems in the bud, without letting them bloom to unmanageable proportions as happened during the two world wars. Realizing the common threats to humanity posed by nuclear weapons, deadly viruses, and changing climates, countries would cooperate. And why wouldn’t they when no country could tackle these problems on its own, and it was in everyone’s interest to cooperate? Yet global politics is proving to be far trickier.

There is now a mad rush to develop Covid-19 vaccines, with governments, and the pharma companies they back, competing to be the first to roll one out. The Russian vaccine is already in the market, even though its safety and efficacy are doubtful. The Americans, the Indians, the Chinese, the British—they are all in the race. The fear is that if the Americans successfully test a vaccine, they may be reluctant to send it to China, and vice versa. The Indians don’t trust the Chinese; the Russians don’t trust the Americans; the Americans don’t trust anyone else with the vaccine. This vicious circle of mistrust has given rise to a ‘vaccine nationalism’. 

Some competition is desirable: Who knows whose vaccine will work? Yet this is also a dangerous race. The Russians claim their concoction works just fine. But given its doubtful development process, what if it gives those inoculated with it a false sense of security? Alternately, let us assume China is the first country to come up with a vaccine that works for sure. In that case, can it deny the vaccine to the Americans? Or at least look to profit from it handsomely?  

If one American dies from a China-made jab—even as it successfully inoculates hundreds of thousands of other folks—this act of ‘bio terrorism’ may soon snowball into a full-blown diplomatic war. Top American infectious disease official Anthony Fauci has already cast doubts on the vaccines being developed in Russia and China. Yet the US will have no option but to import them if they are seen as working elsewhere. 

In the middle of a pandemic, the US has just dusted off an old plan to strengthen its nuclear arsenal, even as it has withdrawn from the World Health Organization. Top carbon-emitting countries in the world are bitterly divided over climate change. All major powers now hold sizable reservoirs of deadly bacteria and virus that they can unleash on their enemies. The corona crisis is one more evidence that on the face of grave global threats, national leaders tend to turn inwards and to use the crisis to their advantage. After all, what do they get by invoking our common humanity?

The Russians have offered Nepal their new discovery. Do we take it? Or do we wait for the ‘more reliable’ American and British ones? And when a successful vaccine is discovered, somewhere, how much can Nepal pay for it, and how quickly can it be imported? Won’t big economic powers want to inoculate all their citizens first before exporting the vaccine? This is not idle speculation. There is no guarantee that the vaccines some big-pocket philanthropists are helping mass produce will actually work. If they don’t, the first few batches of the good vaccine that eventually emerges will go to the highest bidders. Poor places like Nepal will pay for the wait with many lost lives and livelihoods.

The prime minister need not chair the Investment Board Nepal (IBN) any more. The board was established through a 2011 Act, with the goal of pushing large-scale infrastructures so as to lay a strong foundation for the country’s economic takeoff. Almost a decade down the road, this government entity has turned into yet another waste of taxpayer money and under-utilizer of foreign aid. Having failed to efficiently manage political, technical, economic, and aesthetic aspects of mega projects, it doesn’t have one project completed in the past decade. For one, the PM-chaired board has not given its senior management clear guidance to make maximum use of available resources.

The Rwanda Development Board (RBD), a government institution with a mandate to accelerate Rwanda’s economic development by enabling the private sector, was established just two years before the IBN. Today, the RDB provides trusted market intelligence, practical advice, and business tools to help Rwandan companies expand into global markets. It also attracts foreign investment in 12 different sectors such as manufacturing, agro-processing, real estate, ICT, financial services, mining, infrastructure, energy, tourism, health, and education.

In the case of Nepal, the IBN is slowly turning into no more than a government office with some consultants on donor payroll. The RBD, on the other hand, is chaired by a venture capitalist with cabinet ministers as members, along with other representatives from both public and private sectors. One could argue that Rwanda is an authoritarian state that hands out high-end jobs like CEOs to ruling elites. But this is no different in the case of the IBN. All its three CEOs so far have been appointed based on their loyalty to this or that PM rather than on their core competences.

Notably, the Public-Private Partnership and Investment Act, (PPPIA) 2019 had replaced the Investment Board Act (IBA), 2010 with the support of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The new Act envisioned two separate units within the IBN—PPP Unit and Investment Unit—for greater efficiency in investment approval and in processing projects built under PPP mechanism. The Act also aims to make PPP more operational (and the IBN secretariat has a bigger role to play in this regard). But more than a year since the Act’s promulgation, not much has been done to honor its letter and spirit.

The expenditure to run the board has become a sunk cost for the economy as it has failed to yield any desirable fruits. It hasn’t been able to develop the capacity of domestic private sector nor to attract foreign investors. The IBN does not even have a basic mechanism of collecting, processing, and analyzing data, which is vital to get a clear picture of domestic and international markets. Most of its work is routine bureaucratic stuff that predictably fails to excite potential investors. The same can be said of the couple of investment summits Nepal has hosted.

Against this backdrop, time has come to reengineer the board to make it professional enough to push private sector to perform better. If a board chaired by the country’s prime minister fails to deliver for so long, it should either be dissolved or restructured. Or it will continue to consume state resources without having anything to show for it. The country will suffer mightily during the Covid-19 crisis if we retain such an expensive institution that delivers almost nothing to the economy. Pre-Covid-19 projections of the need for investment won’t make any sense in the coming days.

Foreign investment is something that nearly all countries are angling for. To be competitive enough to attract international private investment, we must at least have a decent investment institution equipped with basic institutional and human resources.

There are two ways to do this: i) By restructuring the board and recruiting senior management based on core competence, and ii) By strictly implementing PPPIA to make PPP more operational so that the domestic private sector can contribute more on project development.    

What is it that makes you miserable? What binds you? What makes you suffer? How do you free yourself of your miseries? How do you bring yourself lasting happiness and freedom? The whole lot of philosophies, spiritual systems, and religions have evolved due to humans asking such questions.

The Buddha too dwelt on them. One straightforward explanation that he gave was: human misery came from three unwholesome roots—greed, hatred, and delusion. They are also called the three poisons in Buddhist traditions. Get rid of them, generate their antidotes, and be liberated. Easier said than done. So the Buddha had to work at great lengths to elaborate on them and encourage people to meditate so that they could learn the subtle art of overcoming these poisons.

In less technical terms, let’s call these poisons ‘likes’, ‘dislikes’, and ‘ignorance’. For what we like, we have greed. Some disturbing mental states sprout from this root: desire, longing, passion, lust, self-indulgence, running after money, power, fame, love, and what not. All these steal the peace of mind. They cripple our ability to see things clearly.

Likewise, for what we dislike, we have hatred. Again, there are disturbing mental states that emanate from this root: grudge, resentment, anger, wrath, vengeance, disgust, antagonism, and so on. These, too, steal the peace of mind and cripple our ability to see things clearly.

The third—ignorance—is our naive and distorted way of seeing things. It’s actually this root that gives rise to the other two. But the other two also reinforce it—they nourish in a backward flow. Our naivety and distorted views cause us to like and dislike things, people, food, situations, vacations, jobs, diseases, politicians, rock stars, and so on. We act accordingly, making our likes and dislikes stronger. This in turn blinds us and pushes us further from seeing things clearly, prodding us to react in a deluded way. It goes in a vicious circle—distorted mind magnifies our liking and disliking, which in turn further distorts our minds.

Actually, the first two, liking and disliking, are the two sides of the same coin. And the third, ignorance, does the flipping. When a coin is flipped, one of the two sides is bound to come up. When ignorance comes into play, liking or disliking is bound to happen. And conversely, as there are two sides, flipping becomes possible.

The more your mind is given to liking something, the more it is apt to disliking some other thing. We often love and hate the same person or thing. When your dog comes to sleep at your feet, you become happy and love it. One day, when it doesn’t do so, you become unhappy and hate it. You like your boss when she appreciates your work. The next day, you hate her because she appreciates somebody else’s work. The stronger you love something, the stronger your hate will be when things change slightly. This change, sometimes, can just be of your own mood!

So what’s the way out? How do we overcome these mental poisons? Well, it took 45 years for the Buddha, the fully enlightened one, to help people understand. Plenty for us to explore.