Plenary Session 3
Vaccine Apartheid and Canada’s Role in Global Health
November 13, 12:15 - 1 p.m. EST
It is now plain as day that there has been a failure of global cooperation and international solidarity in the distribution of Covid-19 Vaccines in accordance with transparent, equitable and scientifically sound principles. A “needs-based” global distribution of vaccines paradigm which would have made sense for a variety of reasons and from a moral and ethical standpoint has instead given way to a “means-based” paradigm where wealthy countries like Canada have more vaccines than they are able to use – and many more under contract – while poorer countries, especially in the Global South, have not been able to vaccinate their essential workers and vulnerable populations. Canada (and other wealthy countries) have not only stockpiled vaccines as well as locked up future orders, but they are also doing so at the expense of poorer countries’ access to vaccines. Canada’s multilateral commitments through the COVAX initiative which was meant to prevent this emergent phenomenon of vaccine apartheid has not lived up to expectations. Yet it is clear to the discerning that the push to eradicate Covid and return society to some form of normal will not happen so long as the threat of new variants of the Covid virus remains. This session aims to interrogate this phenomenon of vaccine apartheid and what kind of role Canada should be playing in the international response to COVID-19 and other global health issues.
Moderator:
Dr. Uchechukwu Ngwaba, Assistant Professor, Lincoln Alexander School of Law
Panelists:
Roojin Habibi, Research Fellow, Global Strategy Lab; Fellow, Canadian International Council; Doctoral Candidate, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University
Dr. Obiora Chinedu Okafor, Inaugural York Research Chair in International and Transnational Legal Studies, Osgoode Hall Law School
Dr. Sanjay Ruparelia, Associate Professor, Department of Politics and Public Administration; Jarislowsky Democracy Chair, Ryerson University
And VIDEO REMARKS by The Honourable Anita Anand, Minister of Public Services and Procurement; Receiver General for Canada
Dr. Uchechukwu Ngwaba is an assistant professor at the Lincoln Alexander School of Law. Prior to joining the Lincoln Alexander School of Law, Uchechukwu (Uche) Ngwaba worked as a sessional lecturer in three Australian Universities (Macquarie University, Sydney; University of Western Sydney; and Deakin University, Melbourne).
His research engages multi-disciplinary, comparative and socio-legal methods in exploring complex questions affecting health governance frameworks in the Global North and South. He draws appropriately from multiple disciplines (law, humanities, economics, medicine, etc.) to redefine problems outside disciplinary boundaries and explore solutions based on shared understandings of complex situations in the area of health. His work in the area of transitional justice engages Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) as a useful theoretical lens for critical internationalism to interrogate claims about universalism in the pursuit of international criminal justice, whilst pushing for better representation for the subaltern in international thought and action.
Ngwaba began his career in commercial legal practice in Chief Ladi Rotimi Williams Chambers, Lagos, where he was involved in a number of high-profile litigations before Superior Courts of Nigeria. He subsequently took up an academic position as a Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (NIALS). As one of the principal institutions for legal policy discourse in Nigeria, Ngwaba’s work at NIALS exposed him to policy-oriented research, which traversed a broad field of legal enquiry unified by the focus on achieving policy and systemic changes in Nigeria.
The Honourable Anita Anand was first elected as the Member of Parliament for Oakville in 2019. She was appointed as the Minister of Public Services and Procurement following her election.
Prior to entering government, Minister Anand was a scholar, lawyer, researcher, and and a professor of law at numerous institutions, most recently at the University of Toronto. Born and raised in rural Nova Scotia, she moved to Ontario in 1985. She holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in Political Studies from Queen's University, a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in Jurisprudence from the University of Oxford, a Bachelor of Laws from Dalhousie University, and a Master of Laws from the University of Toronto. She was called to the Bar of Ontario in 1994.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal government accelerated its procurement capabilities on an emergency basis to bulk buy personal protective equipment (PPE) and medical supplies in order to rapidly equip the healthcare system. As Procurement Minister, in order to ensure reliable access to PPE in a hyper-competitive global market, Minister Anand and her department pursued an aggressive procurement strategy, engaging multiple suppliers to ensure diversity in Canada’s supply chains. A significant aspect of this strategy included the establishment of large-scale domestic production of medical supplies.
The role of federal procurement also grew significantly during the pandemic to include rapid tests in addition to the reagents and swabs secured for laboratory-based testing to support the testing programs of provinces and territories.
Roojin Habibi is a Research Fellow at the Global Strategy Lab and the Canadian International Council. Her research bridges law, human rights, and global health, and interweaves research methods from the health, social, and juridical sciences. She holds a Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Doctoral Award for her ongoing PhD research at Osgoode Hall Law School (York University) and has published in a range of peer-reviewed medical and public health journals, scholarly legal journals, and edited volumes.
Having worked for government, nongovernmental and international organizations, Roojin is driven to generate scholarship that has salience and impact both within and beyond academia. Her work is guided by the premise that the interplay of laws, norms and power relations from global to grassroots levels is what ultimately shapes health equity and the realization of the human right to health.
Roojin holds a J.D. (University of Ottawa), a specialization in transnational law (University of Geneva), and a M.Sc. in Global Health (McMaster University). She is Barrister and Solicitor of the Law Society of Ontario and actively teaches and provides research supervision and mentorship to students who are passionate about health and human rights.
Professor Obiora C. Okafor is the Edward B. Burling Chair in International Law and Institutions at John Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies in Washington DC, USA. He is the UN Independent Expert on Human Rights and International Solidarity and a former Chairperson of the UN Human Rights Council Advisory Committee. He has held the York Research Chair in International and Transnational Legal Studies at the Osgoode Hall Law School of York University, Toronto, Canada, and the Gani Fawehinmi Distinguished Chair in Human Rights Law at the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies. He has also served as a Visiting Professor at a number of universities and institutes around the world. He was conferred the Award of Academic Excellence of the Canadian Association of Law Teachers in 2010 and the Gold Medal for Exceptional Research and Major Contributions to Jurisprudence of the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies in 2013. He is the author or co-editor of seven books and over one hundred and twenty articles and other scholarly pieces.
Dr. Sanjay Ruparelia is Associate Professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson University, and holds the Jarislowsky Democracy Chair, made possible by a generous donation from the Jarislowsky Foundation.
In addition to a PhD in Politics from the University of Cambridge, Dr. Ruparelia holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours-Political Science) from McGill University and a Master of Philosophy (Sociology and Politics of Development) from the University of Cambridge.
Prior to joining the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson University, Dr. Ruparelia was Associate Professor of Politics at the New School for Social Research. Prior to the New School, he was assistant director of the South Asia Institute, a lecturer at Columbia University, and served as a consultant to the United Nations.