WASHINGTON: More than 50 US lawmakers have written to President Joe Biden urging him to bolster American assistance to New Delhi to overcome the coronavirus surge in India, asserting that enhanced help from Washington’s, which stands at a modest $100 million, is in US national interest.
“As long as COVID persists in India, there is the potential for additional variants that could pose a serious threat to a vaccinated America,” the lawmakers, led by California Congressman Brad Sherman, the Democratic Chair of the Congressional India Caucus, warned in the March 12 letter, adding, “We must do our part to quell the virus anywhere and everywhere it persists.”
The lawmakers said based on their conversation with New Delhi’s ambassador to the United States, Taranjit Singh Sandhu, India requires several items, most notably oxygen and oxygen production equipment, ventilators, and drugs such as Remdesivir and Tocilizumab.
Asserting that it is also in the US interest for everyone in India to be vaccinated, the lawmakers urged the President provide New Delhi with vaccines to the extent it is possible, including millions of surplus doses of AstraZeneca shots the US is not using and is sitting on, and also make raw materials available to help India make more vaccines.
“Our support for India to help beat back this latest wave is in the US national interest as the pandemic will not end anywhere until it ends everywhere,” the lawmakers said. While recognising that provision of more than $100 million in aid is a “testament to the seven decades of US-India health partnership,” they indicated it is not enough to overcome the crisis in India.
Congressional pressure on ramping up assistance to India comes amid growing concern over variants such as the B1617 and their enhanced transmissability, resistance, and ability to circumvent vaccines. Despite pulling out all stops to gets at least 70 per cent of the country’s population vaccinated, the US is finding it hard to crack even the 40 per cent mark, even as states devise all kinds of new strategies to attract people to vaccination centers, including offering rides and other freebies.
In one controversial move, Ohio Governor Mike Dewine has rolled out five $1 million weekly lottery prize and college scholarships in an effort to overcome the vaccine hesitancy that remains an issue across US.
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