The pandemic has 'turbo-charged' conspiracy theories. When people are confronted by a complex and baffling situation, which seems both defy rational explanation and to upturn expectations of 'normality', such theories seem to offer a 'shortcut' to enlightenment. However, one of the many objections to conspiracy theories is that they are entirely superfluous. The conspiracy theorists have it that the pharmaceutical companies are engaged in a dark and nefarious plot, together with government and medical experts, to foist a suspect vaccine on the public. However, the facts about these organisations are in plain sight and not at all concealed. The 'oligopolistic' structure of the industry ; their stranglehold on patents through their influence on intellectual property law ; their pricing policies ; their close relationships to the state, and subsidy from the state : all these are known, and have been known for some time. (A recent essay in 'Prospect' magazine explores these issues further). Although, as pointed out in a previous blogpost, companies such as AstraZeneca have been comparatively altruistic during the pandemic, the structure of the industry has obviously had implications for the supply of vaccines.
The World Health Organisation defeated smallpox and helped, in large measure, to defeat polio in large parts of the world through accumulating its own supply of vaccines. Why is it not possible for nation states, acting in concert, to deploy their immense powers of procurement and subsidy, to force the pharmaceutical firms to contribute to a supply of coronavirus vaccine, which could help to overcome the pandemic in the Global South ? The power of the pharmaceutical companies depend not on a conspiracy but on an unwillingness to deploy the countervailing power of the world's nation states, which, collectively, is quite immense.