The Emergence of a Vaccine and Global Politics

It is no secret that the race for the Coronavirus vaccine goes way beyond the medical field. As my parents like to say, we are living through World War III, and whoever gets the most effective vaccine first will win this "war." It is not only a matter of money, but a matter of allies and countries one vaccine can reach faster. 

Resembling what China has managed to do by offering billions of dollar loans, and fast access to a promised vaccine in order to get their friends closer and "repair damaged ties" as this New York Times article explains it.  Repairing these ties and bringing more countries closer to the Chinese would skyrocket its economical and political power worldwide. 

China being the first one to develop a vaccine would have a massive impact on global politics, because since the past World Wars it has been proven that the most powerful country is the one with more allies, more tight-knit connections that can serve not only relationship-wise but help countries grow massively economic-wise. There would also be a lot of denial or rejection towards the vaccine by countries who do not consider themselves China's allies and would rather keep risking millions of people's lives instead of enriching the "enemy." 

Image taken from: https://unsplash.com/s/photos/chinese-labs

Covid vaccines and Global Cooperation

Everything in this world requires global cooperation and globalization patterns to be available everywhere. From shoes and clothes to electronics like computers, phones, and electro domestics. 

When it comes to a global pandemic, everyone is involved in a way, and everyone's life is impacted somehow. And when the emergence of a vaccine that will make life a little bit more normal is in play, pharmaceutical industries and governments worldwide need to unite in order to get the so-long-awaited vaccine to as many people as possible. 

Here, I am going to give some examples of global cooperation that is needed in order to achieve this goal. 

First, the vaccine itself. During the last few months, the world has witnessed the biggest race for a vaccine in history. Hundreds of laboratories in multiple countries working -some working together- to accelerate this scientific process. But laboratories alone never could've done this; millions of volunteers cooperating to prove the vaccine's efficiency and billionaires all over the world funding these trials and investigations. For me, this is the first and biggest proof of global cooperation: when civilians decide to get involved in research. 

Second, after the long-awaited cure is found, mass production must start. From syringe manufacturing to other medical tools' production, all of these can be considered almost as important as the vaccine itself, as stated by the New York Times article "Find a Vaccine. Next: Produce 300 Million Vials of It." The extraordinary demand on manufacturing that will come after the vaccine is found will be huge, and global cooperation will be needed because of all the syringes and raw materials that will need to be produced on a global scale. Once again, the solution for a very feared shortage problem goes beyond labs, involving many more industries all around the globe. 

Finally, distribution. At this point, global trade will skyrocket regardless of how many countries decide to accept the vaccine found by one of the pharmaceutical giants. The whole transportation industry will be involved not only to get the vaccine everywhere, but also to transport it with the required safety measures (for instance, the need for shipping it at -80 degrees Celsius ) Extremely rigorous planning will be required for successful massive shipping, involving each and every one of the countries that will receive the vaccine from abroad. 

Image retrieved from: https://unsplash.com/s/photos/shipping

Trying to Immigrate During A Pandemic

 The world has been paralyzed for more than six months now, and you might be wondering, how have people gone back home, to school abroad, or even to a new country to start a new post-pandemic life? Well, the answer to the first one is humanitarian flights. Something that sounds pretty apocalyptic, people trapped in countries that they do not consider their home, far away from family and scared. Well, one would think that those people were the first ones to be rescued, which is true to a certain extent and heavily depends on the country. I have family members that are still waiting for their spot on a humanitarian flight. 

But what about the rest? What about people who want to immigrate to another country and start a new life? Or even move to study? Well, the rest of us have had to pretty much accommodate to the idea of impossible immigration for the last 6-7 months, but after waiting for the longest time, our time has come. From my experience in Colombia, as someone who is wanting to immigrate to the United States as a student, the process has been long and tedious. For starters, the embassy was closed until not long ago, so they are packed. All the appointments I could get were given for December or January a bit close to my expected trip, but I'm sure it will all work out. 

Also, thanks to COVID, all the legal papers that needed to be sent by the university (I-20) in order to get a student visa (F1) were originally sent by mail, as a physical paper. But the pandemic didn't fail to turn all policies around. Something historical has happened, for the first time digitally signed, important papers are being accepted by the embassy. 

Image retrieved from:  https://unsplash.com/s/photos/passport

Coronavirus is Akin to The Lottery

 My mom came up with this strange but extremely accurate term to describe COVID. In the beginning, young people thought they were immune to the virus, it was seen only as a threat to older people with "weaker lungs." Then, the tables turned and 18,19, 20-year-olds started dying and young adults started questioning their "immunity" to the virus. 

In my family, this term originated when one of my dad's uncles who is 79, a smoker, and had Dengue (a tropical disease) at the same time as he was infected with COVID, survived; and one of my mother's friends, 30, a doctor and a runner died. Then we realized that COVID-19 is definitely like the lottery, you might "lose" aka survive, or you can be that one "ballot" that "wins" and dies of coronavirus even if you were the healthiest human in the world. 

It has been very interesting to see people gain conscience and shift from seeing coronavirus as a disease meant to wipe out the elderly, the "useless" (as many people see them), to it being deadly to absolutely everyone. The moral of the story is that there is no way we can know if we are part of those who are gonna win or lose this lottery.

Image taken from: https://unsplash.com/s/photos/lottery

Virtual Souls and Black Squares

Human interactions are the grassroots for sanity -at least for mine- and this pandemic has definitely pushed us all to the verge of insanity. 

When you meet a person, your bodies exchange physical energy or "vibes", you can identify their smell, their way of walking, and even their mannerisms while speaking. But when you're forced to meeting the people you might spend the next 4 years with through a screen, everything changes, and long story short, they do not feel real. 

Social media and online dating or making friends have been some of the things that have skyrocketed the most during the pandemic, as for the last 7 months we haven't been able to be more than 6 feet close to someone else. When you meet someone on Tinder, there are no strings attached and no responsibilities involved, which is great; the lack of pressure makes everything less stressful. But when you find yourself in a "virtual classroom" full of not people, but black squares with a name on them, things get pretty depressing (and awkward).

Personally, I enjoy being put in small breakout rooms (something I like to call a parallel multiverse to the big class) and getting some sort of human interaction, even if it's a black square speaking. Thinking what it could have been, how much more different this first college experience was supposed to be can be very saddening and frustrating, as of now I'm just grateful for those black squares that have given me the opportunity to meet a small part of them during a five-minute discussion, even if they don't feel real. 

Image retrieved from: https://unsplash.com/s/photos/zoom

Covid, Class and College

 If one year ago anyone would've asked me if there was any possibility of me staying in this country longer than June 2020, I would have said "there is not a single chance." But life is full of surprises, and now I'm here, in my room in Colombia taking my first semester of what totally does not feel like college. 

When I think about my personal life in my country, and my college classes colliding, the possibilities of that happening seem very small, but Dr. Tony Stallins proved me wrong when in one of his classes I saw a video of a Colombian woman's story that had previously been very popular in my country. Hearing this story in one of my college classes was not only very weird, but it also made me realize Kentucky and UK might not be as far as I think they are; I might not be as alienated from other students as I think I am, and most importantly, heartbreaking stories like Mrs. Toro's seem so close to home do in fact have an impact in the rest of the world. 

Seein my two worlds collide during a 50-minute lecture was shocking at first, I felt like I wasn't a complete stranger anymore, and I honestly cannot wait for it to happen again. 

Image taken from the NY Times article about Mrs. Toro's story.

UK Core Issue: How Do We Distribute Covid Vaccines? (A Second Possibility)

During this pandemic, we often find ourselves worried about people in our families with pre-COVID diagnosed life-threatening diseases. Many people justify the distribution of a possible vaccine in need rather than "functionality".

Following this logic, if the government was obligated to provide a vaccine for only 1/3 of the population of Fayette County, Ky, they could consider running a survey and collecting personal data of the ill and the healthy, this way they could determine who needs the vaccine with more urgency according to who would is more threatened by COVID. 

Even though I do not fully agree with this idea, one of my classmates from this Geography class came up with it and I think it is a very interesting solution and point of view that should definitely be taken into account if it came to down to only give the vaccine to a restricted amount of people.