Subtopics:

Normative:

1.) at least three perspectives based on personal, cultural, or religious belief

Personal
On March 1, the Philippine government kicked off its national vaccination program amid deep
skepticism. A survey by Octa Research conducted from January 26 to February 1 found that only
19% of Filipinos were willing to get vaccinated. Austriaco attributes this to “uncertainty and fear.”
But this was not always the case. A survey by the Vaccine Confidence Project found that as late as
2015, 82% of Filipinos believed that vaccines are safe and effective. In just 3 years, this number
dropped to 21% and 22%, respectively, after the Philippine government botched a pilot dengue
immunization program and failed to stem massive disinformation in its aftermath. With that being
said, the distribution of Covid vaccines would also be affected by personal decisions. It may seem as
a patriotic duty to do so or in normative ethics the deontological approach which calls for doing
certain things on principle or because they are inherently right, however there will be others who
won't oblige unless there is a good reason to do so and that is if the vaccines delivered here in the
country are actually scientifically proven and tested to be safe, thus for their own safety, which
exhibits the teleological approach which advocates that certain kinds of actions are right because of
the goodness of their consequences. So even if declining vaccination will lead to more possible covid
deaths, they would risk it just so it could save them from the harm of still unknown side effects of the
vaccines.

Religion

There are those who are opposed to the vaccination requirements were based on claims of religious
liberty or under specific laws that would allow for a religious exemption from any COVID-19
vaccine mandates. In some states including Indiana and Massachusetts, there are laws allowing
parents to cite religious reasons to opt out of childhood immunization requirements.

In Indonesia, religion has also played a role in the vaccination drive especially in a recent
controversy involving the vaccines of AstraZeneca. The main question: Are COVID-19 vaccines
halal (permissible) or haram (forbidden) like pork and liquor? The Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI)
in its fatwa (ruling) dated March 16 stated that AstraZeneca was haram because in its production
process it used trypsin from pigs.

Culture
Globally, ethnic minority communities have been disproportionately affected by covid-19. Ethnicity is a
major risk factor for adverse outcomes, along with age, male sex, obesity, deprivation, and
comorbidities. Now, at the start of the UK’s national vaccination programme, culturally competent
conversations with ethnic minority communities are more important than ever to enable informed
consent, allay genuine concerns, break down barriers to uptake, and engage facilitators for the roll-out.
Cultural competence is defined as the ability of health systems to provide care to patients with diverse
values, beliefs, and behaviours by tailoring delivery to meet patients’ social, cultural, and linguistic
needs. Open and mature conversations with communities are important to reassure people about the
safety and efficacy of covid-19 vaccines, along with clear and accessible explanations of the accelerated
authorisation process used by the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

We recently recommended that ethnic minority communities should be considered a priority for
vaccination, but this is not yet in place. One potential alternative strategy is to use validated risk scores
such as QCOVID that consider a range of risk factors, including comorbidities, ethnicity, age, and
deprivation.

2. consider the three countries with the most COVID cases and their population