March 19th, 2021

The Honorable Joseph R. Biden President of the United States The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, D.C. 20500

President Biden:

We write to commend your administration’s efforts to tackle the pandemic both at home and abroad, and to urge you to prioritize Mexico, Central America, and the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean in global vaccine distribution. We favorably saw your recent decision to send 2.5 million doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines to Mexico and 1.5 million to Canada. This is a good start. Still, we strongly encourage you to work with global health experts to create a comprehensive framework based on U.S. supply of surplus vaccines and global health security to help ensure our neighbors have sufficient vaccines for their entire population.

As representatives of the American people, we applaud your campaign to get our country vaccinated as quickly as possible. This must be our number one focus. Still, in today’s globalized world, we cannot completely defeat the pandemic anywhere until it has been defeated everywhere. As Secretary of State Anthony Blinken recently put it, “Unless and until everyone in the world is vaccinated, then no one is really fully safe.”1

Thus far, the global vaccine effort has been disappointing. UN Secretary General António Guterres recently called the distribution of vaccines “wildly uneven and unfair.” According to him, ten countries account for 75% of all the vaccines which have been administered globally, while over 130 countries haven't been given a single dose.2 Part of this inequality stems from wealthy countries acquiring far more doses than inoculating their populations requires. According to the One Campaign’s estimates, the United States, EU, Australia, Canada, UK, and Japan have

1 "Secretary Antony J. Blinken With Yalda Hakim of 'Impact with Yalda Hakim' on BBC World News," February 19, 2021. Available from: https://www.state.gov/secretary-antony-j-blinken-with-yalda-hakim-of-impact-with- yalda-hakim-on-bbc-world-news/. 2 António Guterres “Remarks to the Security Council Open Meeting on Ensuring Equitable Access to COVID-19 Vaccines in Contexts Affected by Conflict and Insecurity,” February 17, 2021. Available from: https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/speeches/2021-02-17/ensuring-equitable-access-covid-19-vaccines-contexts- affected-conflict-and-insecurity-remarks-security-council.

collectively purchased 1.2 billion excess vaccines. The United States alone is projected to have 450 million excess vaccines.3

In your short time in office, you have taken a number of actions to supercharge the global vaccination effort. As part of the G7 Summit, you announced that the U.S. will be providing $4 billion to the COVAX program over the next two years, with around $2 billion of that being distributed immediately. Similarly, on your first full day in office, you issued National Security Memorandum 1, which outlined how the United States would be at the forefront of the international effort to defeat the pandemic.

In this Memorandum, you directed Secretary Blinken and Secretary Becerra to “promptly deliver... a framework for donating surplus vaccines, once there is sufficient supply in the United States, to countries in need.”4 In distributing these excess vaccines, we urge you to prioritize our closest neighbors, especially Mexico, Central America, and the rest of the Western Hemisphere. The region has been devastated by the pandemic. As of September 2020, Latin America and the Caribbean had the highest number of cases and deaths on a per capita basis.5 In particular, the second and third countries with the deadliest death toll from COVID-19, after the United States, are Brazil and Mexico.6 This year, the region has the third highest death toll worldwide and is now facing dangerous variants of the virus.7 Recent reports suggest that the Western Hemisphere is struggling to get its own deals for vaccines through companies like Pzifer. 8

Vaccinating everyone is essential, from sub-Saharan Africa to Southeast Asia to the Western Hemisphere. However, Mexico, Central America, and the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean have an outsized impact on the United States. These countries are deeply intertwined in U.S. supply chains and are indispensable parts of the U.S. economy. If we are to avoid the shortages of personal protective equipment that ensued last year at the beginning of the pandemic and strengthen our supply chains, as outlined in the Executive Order on America’s Supply Chains, it is imperative we provide assistance to our neighbors.9 Before the pandemic, for example, Mexico was our largest trading partner. 10 According to one estimate, intermediate inputs made up 40% of our imports

3 "Rich Countries on Track to Stockpile Over 1 Billion Surplus C19 Vaccines," One Campaign, February 19, 2021. 4"National Security Memorandum on United States Global Leadership to Strengthen the International COVID-19 Response and to Advance Global Health Security and Biological Preparedness," January 21, 2021. 5 Diana Enriquez et. al., "Latin America’s COVID-19 Nightmare," Foreign Affairs, September 1, 2020. 6 Mike Ives et. al., “Mexico's death toll becomes the world’s third highest, surpassing India’s,” The New York Times, January 29, 2021. 7 Michaeleen Doucleff, "Why Scientists Are Very Worried About The Variant From Brazil," NPR, January 27, 2021. 8 Madlen Davies et. al, "'Held to Ransom': Pfizer Plays Hardball in Covid-19 Vaccine Negotiations with Latin American Countries," STAT News, February 23, 2021. 9 David J. Lynch, “Biden orders sweeping review of U.S. supply chain weak spots,” Washington Post, February 23, 2021. 10"U.S.-Mexico Trade Facts," Office of the United States Trade Representative.

from Mexico and 75% for our exports.11 Mexico is also an essential source of medical instruments, which are vital in the fight against COVID-19. If we want to reduce our reliance on China for supply chains, Latin America and the Caribbean will be critical.

The flow of people is another reason why Latin America has an outsized importance to us. In 2019, the Western Hemisphere accounted for 60% of all international tourism to this country. 12 Similarly, 52% of all immigrants in the United States were born in Western Hemisphere countries. 13 Many people in the region flee to the United States to escape violence and poverty, and the pandemic has greatly exacerbated these conditions. Improving conditions in Latin America is a prerequisite for instituting an orderly and fair immigration system. This will prove impossible as long as COVID- 19 ravages our neighbors.

In today’s highly interconnected world, our country’s victory against COVID-19 and our economic recovery will be incomplete unless we extend a helping hand to our closest neighbors.

Sincerely,

Joaquin Castro Member of Congress Member of Congress

Dina Titus Member of Congress Member of Congress

11 Mary Amiti et. al. "Why Renegotiating NAFTA Could Disrupt Supply Chains," Peterson Institute for International Economics, April 18, 2019. 12 UN World Tourism Organization data. Available from: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1012283/united-states- inbound-tourist-arrivals-by-region/. 13 "Regions of Birth for Immigrants in the United States, 1960-Present," Migration Policy Institute, Undated. Available from: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/regions-immigrant-birth-1960-present.

Adriano Espaillat Member of Congress Member of Congress

Vicente Gonzalez James P. McGovern Member of Congress Member of Congress

Andy Levin Veronica Escobar Member of Congress Member of Congress