Solidarity? When it comes to masks, it's every nation for itself

Even among Western countries that are nominally allies, accusations of unscrupulous behaviour have underscored the mounting anxiety over mask shortages.
For representational purposes (Photo | AP)
For representational purposes (Photo | AP)

PARIS: From government stock seizures to sales to the highest bidder on airport tarmacs, the hunt for face masks amid the coronavirus outbreak has become a global free-for-all where the rules of fair play no longer apply.

Officials worldwide were caught short by the crisis with most countries unable to manufacture the millions of masks needed every day for health workers alone.

So nearly everyone is turning to China and other Asian producers, and some players are doing whatever it takes to get their hands on the coveted stocks.

"Procurement markets for COVID-19 supplies are collapsing, and the traditional means of competition and transparency are really not being used," Christopher Yukins, a law professor at George Washington University said during a videoconference Thursday.

Even among Western countries that are nominally allies, accusations of unscrupulous behaviour have underscored the mounting anxiety over mask shortages.

The president of the Ile-de-France region encompassing Paris, Valerie Pecresse, said this week that a shipment of masks ordered for her hard-hit department was snatched at the last minute by "Americans who made a higher bid".

"The Americans pay cash sight unseen, which obviously can be more tempting for people just looking to make money off the entire world's distress," she said.

Pecresse offered no details on the purported American buyers, but officials in at least two other French regions also claimed US buyers swept in to acquire their Chinese orders -- in one case on the airport runway just as the plane was about to take off.

In Washington, a senior administration official told AFP "the United States government has not purchased any masks intended for delivery from China to France."

The buyers could well have been private firms, or middlemen working on behalf of individual American states.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Thursday he was "concerned" by a report that a mask order came in smaller than expected after part of it was sold to "a higher bidder" -- a not-so-subtle reference to the US.

"We understand that the needs in the US are very extensive, but it's the same in Canada, so we have to work together," Trudeau said.

Yet it appears unlikely that cooperation is in the cards.

Jean-Sylvestre Mongrenier at the Thomas More Institute, a Franco-Belgian think-tank, warned of "endemic insecurity between nations, or even a state of anarchy if the international public order disintegrates".

"But outbidding on a mask delivery is more a case of competing for access to resources. It's unfortunate but it's not going to spark an outbreak of hostilities."

Yet the competition can be "frightening," as recounted by Ukrainian lawmaker Andriy Motovylovets after a trip to China last month to secure a mask shipment.

"Our consuls who go to factories find their colleagues from other countries (Russia, USA, France) who are trying to obtain our orders," he wrote on Facebook.

"We have paid upfront by wire transfer and have signed contracts. But they have more money, in cash. We have to fight for each shipment."

And since only a handful of Chinese mask producers have export licenses, most have to use middlemen to sell to foreign buyers, vastly increasing the number of intermediaries in a seller's market.

"We're dealing with direct negotiations, over-the-counter deals, which are pragmatic during health emergencies but which often go hand-in-hand with favouritism, misappropriations and price gouging," Laurence Folliot Lalliot, a public law professor in Paris, wrote in French daily Le Monde.

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