The travel ban: An MSU professor in South Africa’s perspective

On Friday, Nov. 26, the United States government followed the lead of many European countries in placing travel restrictions on people from eight southern African countries due to the discovery of a new COVID-19 variant, called Omicron. One of these countries is South Africa, where I am currently based.

I am on a Fulbright Fellowship this year to study history with colleagues from the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein. I thought it might be useful to hear from someone in South Africa as to the local perspective on this new variant.

Many medical experts and the World Health Organization have decried the travel bans as not based on sound science, and as being harmful economically to the region — and in particular for its most vulnerable citizens. Within South Africa, there is great frustration felt toward the European and North American countries that led the travel shut down, because the variant has been found in many places already.

This frustration comes because the reason the world knows about this new variant is that South African testing and sequencing operations are amazing — perhaps the best in the world. This is because the medical infrastructure for this type of testing was built up through the 1990s and early 2000s as the country dealt with devastating and widespread tuberculosis (TB) and HIV/AIDS epidemics.

This infrastructure is being put to good use, which is why B.1.1.529 (Omicron) was first detected here, as was the Beta variant in October 2020. I want to be perfectly clear here: Detected first in South Africa does NOT necessarily mean it mutated here.

South Africans feel like they are being punished for having fast, world-leading scientists and being open about their findings. Thus, the anger toward the travel ban is not only that it cuts off this region from the rest of the world (at a time when many Europeans take holidays here as we move into summer), but also because the rapid imposition of the bans may encourage other countries that detect new variants to try to hide them in the future. This would make all of us globally less safe.

There is also the sense that southern Africa is being punished for its relatively low vaccination rate. This is, in part, a function of vaccines being hoarded by countries in the global north, and these countries being unwilling to waive intellectual property rights to the vaccine. While South African vaccination rates are steadily improving (up to about 36 percent of the adult population at the moment), other, poorer countries in the region struggle to access the life-saving jabs that their citizens so desire.

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As for me, and for other South Africans, what is ordinary life like right now? Honestly, it is pretty good here at the moment. COVID-19 cases countrywide are still relatively low. South Africans are very diligent about masking in schools, workplaces and on public transit. The vaccination rate continues to climb. The school year is almost finished, and people are looking forward to summer holidays at the beach. It is very easy to spend most of your time outside here during the warm months.

So, what should be done? It is time to undo the travel bans. It is also time to speed up the delivery of vaccines to parts of the world that still lack access — and bring the vaccine off patent so it can be manufactured more quickly in more places. Finally, you —yes, you — need to do your part and get vaccinated if you have not done so (or boosted if you have).

When you do this for yourself and those around you, it also benefits the global community by reducing the risk of virus mutations. We all can play our part in helping to stop the next Omicron before it evolves.

John Aerni-Flessner is an associate professor in the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities at Michigan State University. This piece represents the author's personal opinion, it does not represent the views of the U.S. government.

This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: It is time to undo the travel bans in response to COVID-19 variations