Dr. Zeke Emanuel looks like he will end up being one of the more controversial of the 10-member coronavirus task force assembled by Joe Biden. Emanual, who was a key architect of the Affordable Care Act, has generated plenty of controversy in the past. Now he is gearing up to create controversy once again, by laying out a plan where other nations would receive the coronavirus vaccine, developed here in the U.S., before Americans would.
The Fair Priority Model calls for a fair international distribution of vaccine in favor of a “vaccine nationalism,” as he and his colleagues call it. Emanual laid out his plan in a co-authored paper released back in September.
The Fair Priority Model would allow the country that produces the vaccine to hold on to enough supply to keep transmission rates below a certain level. Once that level is reached, the model supports distributing the vaccine internationally. That would mean sending the vaccine to other countries before every American would have an opportunity to receive it.
In 2014, Dr. Emanual argued life is not worth living past 75, saying, “creativity, originality and productivity are pretty much gone for the vast, vast majority of us.” The oncologist also argued, “Living too long is also a loss. It renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining, a state that may not be worse than death but is nonetheless deprived.”
His views are interesting to note now, considering he is working on a coronavirus task force with a 77-year-old who may soon be considered the leader of the free world.
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