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For much of world, vaccines still scarce July 28, 2021
As of July 26 the City of Toronto has jabbed its citizens in the arm 4.3 million times. Provincially, 89.5 per cent of the eligible population of Ontario has been at least partially vaccinated. Globally, 3.5 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been distributed.
But there’s a problem. Seventy-five per cent of those doses have been deployed in just 10 countries.
“The haves are opening up, while the have-nots are locking down,” WHO director Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus tweeted.
“Vaccine justice and equity are major concerns in the global south,” noted Development and Peace-Caritas Canada spokesperson Minaz Kerawala in an e-mail. “In many countries even health care workers and the elderly are waiting for their first dose. We think that in addition to funding for better vaccine access in the global south, what is needed is more investment in education to boost vaccine confidence and uptake.”
Biden call fuels vaccine effort for poor nations May 14, 2021
After U.S. President Joe Biden’s surprise turnaround in favour of temporarily suspending patent protection for COVID-19 vaccines, Church leaders are redoubling their lobbying, hoping a World Trade Organization agreement will get vaccines into arms south of the equator.
Meanwhile Canada refuses to say whether it will support the new U.S. position at the next WTO meetings June 8-9.
At previous WTO meetings to discuss the issue, Canada asked a series of wide-ranging questions about how the TRIPS waiver would speed up vaccine production and distribution. The questions prevented the proposal from moving forward.
A backbench MP who gets things done May 9, 2021
Liberal MP John McKay doesn’t give a damn whether he’s in cabinet or not. But he does give a damn.
In an extraordinary 24-year career riding Parliament’s backbenches and chairing committees in government and opposition, McKay has steered legislation through Parliament to make sure Canada’s foreign aid goes to poor people, helped shape reforms to Parliament giving more voice to individual members and nearly forced a reluctant Conservative government to create a mining, oil and gas ombudsperson with real power to investigate and expose Canadian companies that violate human rights abroad.
Generous benefactors will match monthly donations pledged to Development and Peace.
MONTREAL, February 17, 2021
Development and Peace Caritas Canada has launched an exciting matching project for its Share Year-Round monthly donation program. All monthly donations pledged from Ash Wednesday until Pentecost (Sunday, May 23, 2021) will be matched dollar for dollar, up to a total of $130,000. This includes new pledges and any increases to monthly amounts already being donated.
This initiative is funded by several Canadian religious communities, who have been steadfast allies of Development and Peace since its founding in 1967. They include the Scarboro Missions; The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate (OMI Lacombe Canada); the Jesuits of Canada; the Sisters of St. Martha of Antigonish; The Missionary Oblates of St. Boniface; the Sisters of Our Lady of the Missions; The Sisters of St. Joseph of Sault Ste. Marie; St. Peter s Abbey; and the Ursulines of the Canadian Union.