How oligarchs are buying spots at the front of the vaccine line
Hello, and welcome to Oligarchy. We are tracking how Covid-19 and the world’s response to it is affecting the super-rich — and what that means for power and politics.
HEALTH HAVENS
I’ve always been fascinated by the kind of dystopian novels that imagine wealthy people suddenly facing scarcity, and their civilized façade collapsing in the face of their desperation to survive. Increasingly – as the UK and the EU squabble over vaccines – it feels a bit like we’re living in one.
It’s not impossible to imagine the ego clash between Boris Johnson and Ursula von der Leyen spilling over into a full-blooded trade war, with knock-on effects delaying the world’s vaccination programs for months or even years. The prospect of lives being lost because politicians can’t get over themselves is a distinctly annoying one, so it’s nice to realize it is possible to escape it – provided, that is, you can afford it, and you know the right people.
- “People with connections came here and got vaccines that were provided on a ‘friends and family’ basis,” an anonymous investor in the United Arab Emirates told the FT. “Sheikhs have [access to] their own stashes — it’s all around the majlis for jabs.”
The UAE has had one of the world’s fastest vaccination programs, and realized early on that this success was an opportunity to make money from the citizens of countries without plentiful vaccines; or from the citizens of countries that vaccinate according to need, rather than according to wealth. As early as January, a London private members club was running trips to Dubai and India, at a total cost of around $50,000 per vaccination, to help people jump the queue.