SNUAC Asia Regional Information Center and Northeast Asia Center are jointly holding an international academic conference on “Political Economy of the COVID-19 Vaccination in Asia” on March 30th, sponsored by the National Research Foundation of Korea.

Due to COVID-19, the entire world has suffered from the spread and resurgence of the pandemic and lost over 2 million lives. Only a year has passed since this disease emerged, but scientists over the world have endeavored to develop a vaccine, which was approved and is now being administered. We now seem to have entered a new phase of COVID-19.

This conference will cover the issues around COVID-19 vaccination in terms of Asian countries and seek the possibility of healthcare cooperation of international societies beyond vaccine nationalism and vaccine diplomacy.

The conference will be held in three sessions. Session 1 will start with a presentation by Prof. Jaehun Jung (Department of Preventive Medicine, Gachon University College of Medicine), “Preparations for COVID-19 Vaccination”, which will cover scientific facts around the COVID-19 vaccine. After that, Prof. Jungwon Huh (SNUAC) will give a briefing on current situations on vaccinations and major issues in Asian countries.

Session 2 will be held in English, and researchers from the Philippines, Singapore, India, and Taiwan will present the COVID-19 vaccination situations in the respective countries and hold a round-table discussion. Session 3 will be seeking international cooperation in healthcare and medicine. First, Prof. Jaehyung Kim (Korea National Open University) will give a presentation on the politicization of vaccines, and then Dr. Jeong-Kyung Seo (Visiting Researcher, SNUAC) will present on “Global Healthcare Governance in the Pandemic Era: China’s Vaccine Diplomacy”. Lastly, Dr. Soon Ae Kim (Korea Foundation for International Healthcare) will give a presentation on “Measures for International Healthcare Cooperation”.

Speakers: