The COVID-19 Pandemic and Access to Vaccination in Bangladesh: a Critical Review

Abstract

This paper delineates the diverse perspectives of the vicious COVID-19 pandemic and access to vaccination in Bangladesh. It also depicts the discrepancies as to access to vaccine and vaccination campaign aside from assorted socio-economic impacts and challenges in Bangladesh with plausible way-outs. The fight for combating the demonized coronavirus is laudable amid the country’s limited resources, vulnerable healthcare system and vaccine hesitation. But the estimated cost of vaccination is under criticism because the country has received a substantial amount of vaccines as gift or free of cost donation from rich countries especially from the United States. Due to the pandemic, the socio-economic loss sustained by the country has created extra burden for the economy. No doubt, the coronavirus has taken an acid test of the global healthcare system. Even the economically advanced countries with sophisticated healthcare facilities have experienced the horrific fatality of the pandemic for a long time. But during the pandemic, the world has witnessed further polarization of the countries with major political and economic power dynamics in the name of coordinated fighting of the persisting crisis. Together with the financial constraints of low-income countries in Africa and Asia, the vaccine crisis and monopoly caused by the profit-driven attitude of most multinational pharma companies and geopolitical interests of some high income countries have galvanized the global vaccine inequity undermining the notion of distributive justice with a few exceptions. But the contagious coronavirus taught that people’s safety of a particular country is not possible without safety of other countries. Most existing papers on the COVID-19 pandemic linking Bangladesh depict its various detrimental impacts from health science and socio-economic aspects. But this paper critically reviews the chronological aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh starting from influx of the virus to its all-out combating measures highlighting human casualty, advent of vaccine, vaccine inequity, access to vaccination, vaccine diplomacy, campaign, hesitation and rerated constraints along with prevailing as well as post COVID-19 socio-economic impacts.