Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

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Woody
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by Woody »

But the Delta variant is proving to be so much more infective
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

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Yeah, I guess only accepting PCR tests which are much less available than the rapid test would lower the numbers...
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by xandreu »

Woody wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 4:06 pm But the Delta variant is proving to be so much more infective
True, but it hasn't continued to mutate into anything even deadlier, so far. Many - including those involved in vaccine production - say that it is now unlikely to and will even begin to wane in the severity of the symptoms it causes.
The difference between animals and humans is that animals would never allow the dumb ones to lead the pack.
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by CEOCambodiaNews »

Interesting (long) read; full article on the link below.

China Isn’t the Only Reason for Cambodia’s Vaccination Success
More than good relations with China, Cambodia’s vaccination success comes down to effective and responsive government actions in a moment of crisis.
By David Hutt
November 04, 2021

There is a tendency in Cambodian political debates to overemphasize the importance of foreign powers, either as saviors or destroyers. The emerging conventional wisdom says that Cambodia’s vaccination campaign successes (with 78.1 percent of the population now fully vaccinated) is almost entirely down to China, the provider of nearly all vaccines Cambodia has used.

Prime Minister HE has done more than most to promote this narrative. “If I do not rely on China, whom do I rely on?” he commented in July. “Many people promised me much – but in the end, promises are not vaccines – and it was only the Chinese vaccines that actually arrived.”

A month earlier, he said: “Without the donations and sales of vaccines from China, we would not have vaccinated the Cambodian people.”

A recent report by U.S.-based NPR was headlined “Cambodia’s ties with China helped it achieve a high COVID vaccination rate.” Ou Virak, of the Future Forum think tank, was paraphrased as saying: “HE also gets credit for going all in on the Chinese vaccines, even before they won approval from the World Health Organization, securing an abundant supply well ahead of other, wealthier countries.” In the same report, Benjamin Zawacki, of the Asia Foundation, called it a “perfect example of HE’s close relations with China paying dividends in a way that no one might have expected.”

There is a good deal of truth in these claims. China has so far delivered around 35 million two-dose vaccines to Cambodia, enough for its entire population. (Cambodia has also received millions of vaccines from other sources, such as the mainly Western-funded COVAX facility.) Moreover, China was the only real supplier ready to deliver such large numbers of vaccines in early 2020. Had Cambodia snubbed Sinopharm or Sinovac (as HE insinuated he might in December 2020) and instead waited for Western supplies or COVAX donations, it manifestly wouldn’t have achieved such high vaccination rates as quickly as it did (60 percent of the adult population fully vaccinated by mid-July).

One recent study found that China has shipped 67 percent of its promised 100 million doses internationally, while the likes of Australia and Canada have each delivered only 8 percent. Nor can it be contested that friendship with Beijing has been a motivating factor for where China’s vaccines have been donated. Cambodia and Laos, Beijing’s two closest friends in Southeast Asia, have received vaccine donations from China accounting for 22 percent and 20 percent of their populations, respectively, according to the IMF-WHO COVID-19 Vaccine Supply Tracker database. Vietnam, Thailand, and Indonesia, by comparison, have received the equivalent of 2 percent, 1 percent, and 0 percent.

Examining the costs of vaccine procurement is difficult. It was reported in June that Cambodia spent $170 million on buying around 20 million vaccines, presumably those from China. We may assume, then, that it has spent nearly $250 million on the 30 million vaccines it has ordered from China. We know that Malaysia said in August it spent 4.36 billion ringgit (around $1.04 billion) on purchasing over 87 million COVID-19 vaccine doses, the majority from Pfizer-BioNTech but also around 20 million from Sinovac. As such, Cambodia clearly saved a good deal of state funds by relying on China-made vaccines.

But when speaking of Chinese benevolence and gratitude, it’s important to remember that the vast majority of vaccines Cambodia has received from China have been bought, not donated. It has received 6.3 million vaccines as donations from China but received 28.3 million purchased vaccines, according to Bridge’s China COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker. Laos has relied entirely on donated vaccines, which explains why it has received fewer (just 5.3 million vaccines from China since late 2020) and why it has vaccinated fewer people (just 38.2 percent of the population).

Yes, Cambodia and Laos received more vaccine donations from China, but because the vast majority of Chinese vaccines globally have been sold and not donated (1.3 billion versus 90 million, according to one estimate), it changes the dynamics. Cambodia wasn’t allowed to buy vaccines simply because it was a friend of Beijing. After all, the largest purchaser of China-made vaccines has been Indonesia (215 million doses), followed by Brazil (around 100 million).

Put differently, Beijing hasn’t made its vaccine sales dependent on its geopolitical ties. It has sold vaccines to any country that wants to buy them. This is why it is important to distinguish donations from sales. For vaccine donations, geopolitics matters — and Cambodia has been the largest recipient. But vaccine purchases, not vaccine donations, from China have been the deciding factor for Cambodia’s vaccination program — and vaccine purchases don’t come down to geopolitics. If it was all geopolitics, Beijing would have donated around 15 million vaccines to Laos, not just enough for 20 percent of its population.

Put it in another way: Phnom Penh could have bought vaccines from China even if HE’s government hadn’t previously spent the last five or so years allying itself with Beijing, at the expense of its ties to the West. So it was decisions made in Phnom Penh, not in Beijing, that meant Cambodia received more than an ample supply of vaccines (and early on) so it could enroll as a lightning-speed inoculation campaign.

Moreover, other Southeast Asian countries have almost entirely depended on Chinese vaccines, yet they have by no means achieved anything like the vaccination successes of Cambodia. Laos has received 5.3 million vaccines from China since late 2020, yet it has fully vaccinated just 38.2 percent of its population. Indeed, Laos has decided not to buy vaccines, a decision made in Vientiane not Beijing. According to the IMF-WHO COVID-19 Vaccine Supply Tracker, Cambodia has secured enough vaccine pledges (bought or donated) for 105 percent of its population, compared to just 50 percent for Laos. On the other hand, Vietnam has secured enough for 119 percent of its population, yet just 25.8 percent of Vietnamese are fully-vaccinated to date. France has secured vaccines for 319 percent of its population, yet just 68 percent of the French are fully vaccinated. As such, there is no determined causation between receiving vaccines and running an efficient vaccination campaign.

Full article: https://thediplomat.com/2021/11/china-i ... n-success/
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John Bingham
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

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Interesting and surprisingly positive for Mr Hutt.
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by Anchor Moy »

John Bingham wrote: Fri Nov 05, 2021 1:25 am Interesting and surprisingly positive for Mr Hutt.
Yes, worth the read I think. :thumb:
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by AndyKK »

It's a good read, and interesting with it's numbers of vaccines that have been provided too these few countries. But that is only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. The Chinese must have hell of a production line, to keep on knocking out those vaccines. Too consider what they have donated and sold, I wonder how much money they have made up to date. It's just the numbers that are being knocked out.
I also agree that the majority that have been vaccinated here in Cambodia, would have not been possible without the vaccines from China. Also I don't think there is an argument with how effective the vaccines are, due to the amount of people vaccinated on Cambodia's program. But then again I would think the important one's of the country are not probably vaccinated with any two of the Chinese vaccines, I would have thought best not too chance, in case.
But I hope now with what the authorities have shown with such a precise program, it will be able to do the same with other potential contagious illness that may have been ignored, or put off at this point.
Always "hope" but never "expect".
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Re: Cambodia Hailed as Example of COVID-19 Vaccine Success

Post by sanjuro »

A little perspective; Ruili, China:
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandso ... ovid-polic
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