| Pandemic and Necro Politics Mbembe Achille in his book Necropolitics describes the use of social power to dictate how some people must live and some must die. In India, multitudes of the poor died on the streets, unable to reach medical facilities. In some hospitals, many marginalised people infected with COVID-19 died due to lack of access to oxygen cylinders. The death toll was so high that there was a social numbness towards death. Likewise, in Europe, those unable to afford medical facilities were mostly Asians, Africans, Latin Americans, migrants and the poor without medical insurance. The political system has already determined who will live and who will die during the pandemic. Certainly, there were deaths among the rich and elite but at least, they had access to medical facilities whereas the poor could not even get tested in the hospital. One can argue that the situation was inevitable because hospitals were overwhelmed by the sheer number of cases, but the fact is, we have built a medical system that denies access to socially disadvantaged communities. The question one has to raise is, why do the elderly, weak and powerless have to die whilst the rich and the powerful have life-saving access to the healthcare system?
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The political system has already determined who will live and who will die during the pandemic. Certainly, there were deaths among the rich and elite but at least, they had access to medical facilities whereas the poor could not even get tested in the hospital.
| Contact tracing and mass surveillance During the pandemic, technological applications were created to track and alert people if they came into contact with someone infected. While it looks good as a system, it poses the risk of personal information and data being collected and used for surveillance purposes. The pandemic has been exploited to normalise mass surveillance, denying people the right to freedom of life.
| Pharma-colonial Necro Politics In the past, nations colonised other nations, stripping away their natural resources violently. Today, there is a rising trend of pharmaceutical companies having the power to determine life and death. I have coined the term “Pharma colonialism” to denote how poor nations are controlled and colonised through the provision of vaccines. It is no longer a matter of economics, but also the politics of death and the monopoly of pharmaceutical industries. By dictating terms and conditions of supplying vaccines, a few pharmaceutical companies have power to decide who should live and who should die, with rich nations having priority access to vaccines when people were dying every minute.
24 INSiGHT MAY 2022
