Global Duties in Crisis Response: A Duty to Help, and a Duty Not to Harm Global Access to COVID-19 Vaccines?

Antoine de Bengy Puyvallée
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Antoine de Bengy Puyvallée: Antoine de Bengy Puyvallée is the corresponding author (antoined@globe.uio.no) and is affiliated with the Centre for Global Sustainability, University of Oslo, Norway.

Progress in Development Studies, 2026, vol. 26, issue 1, 85-91

Abstract: During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments widely recognized a duty to ensure global access to vaccines. What this duty entailed, however, became highly contested. I highlight how different actors formulated this duty and the political consequences that this duty-making had during the pandemic and its aftermath. I show that wealthy countries acknowledged a duty to share vaccine doses, while activists and Global South governments formulated a duty to share the ‘vaccine recipe’. I suggest moreover that the pandemic also facilitated the emergence of a negative duty ‘not to hoard vaccines’—in addition to a duty to help. I argue that global crisis response should seek to mobilize global solidarity initiatives (duty of charity) and simultaneously limit the negative consequences of countries’ own domestic responses (duty of justice).

Keywords: Pandemic; Global health; Vaccines; COVID-19; Duties; Charity; Justice; EU; COVAX (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:prodev:v:26:y:2026:i:1:p:85-91

DOI: 10.1177/14649934251414285

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