Press releases

New Oxfam International Executive Director Gabriela Bucher’s first public announcement today launches the organization’s new 10-year strategy to fight inequality to end poverty and injustice around the world.

Good news on the AstraZeneca/Oxford COVID-19 vaccine trial. All pharmaceutical companies should work together for a people’s vaccine by urgently transferring their technology and know-how, in order for everyone in the world to have access to a safe and effective vaccine.

Renewed fighting in Western Sahara between the Frente Polisario and Morocco after a 29-year ceasefire, threatens regional stability and renews fears for the security and future of Sahrawi refugees – most of whom have been displaced since 1975.

Responding to the G20 Heads of State Summit, Rebecca Gowland, Head of Inequality, Campaigns and Policy, said: “In 2020 the richest economies bolstered their resilience to Covid-19 with a $10 trillion injection while providing 2,000 times less than that – $5 billion – in debt relief to the poorest countries. In the direst global health and socio-economic crises for 100 years the G20 has failed to adequately support the poorest people in the world.

The European Union risks fuelling conflict and human rights abuses around the world if it adopts the European Peace Facility (EPF) in its current form, warned Oxfam and 39 other civil society organisations with expertise on peace, human rights and the protection of civilians.

Other members of the G20 have exported more than US$17bn worth of arms to Saudi Arabia since it became involved in the conflict in Yemen in 2015 but have given only a third of that amount in aid to people caught in the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis, Oxfam said today.

Millions of people in Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, already hit by damage from last month’s monster hurricane Eta, are now facing an even bigger crisis from Iota, a category five hurricane that made landfall overnight on Nicaragua’s Caribbean coast.

“Moderna’s discovery could be a real game-changer in the fight against COVID-19. However, on its own, Moderna can only produce enough vaccine for less than seven percent of the global population by the end of 2021, almost all of whom will be in rich countries," said Anna Marriott, Oxfam’s Health Policy Manager, in response to the announcement today from the National Institutes of Health that early data shows Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine is nearly 95 percent effective.

Over 1,000 health professionals from 66 countries have signed a letter urging the G20 to cancel the debt of developing countries, ahead of tomorrow’s extraordinary G20 Finance Ministers meeting.

With its new long-term budget, the EU missed a chance to put itself at the forefront of a fair and green recovery from the coronavirus pandemic, Oxfam said today.