Africans in the continent and the diaspora have condemned comments by two French doctors that Covid-19 coronavirus vaccine should be tested on Africans first.

The French doctors, Dr Jean-Paul Mira and Dr Camille Locht, made the  suggestion recently in a TV discussion about medical trials for a Covid-19 vaccine. 

If I can be provocative, shouldn’t we be doing this study in Africa, where there are no masks, no treatments, no resuscitation? A bit like it is done elsewhere for some studies on AIDS. In prostitutes, we try things because we know that they are highly exposed and that they do not protect themselves,” said Dr Jean-Paul Mira, from Cochin hospital in Paris. 

“You’re right, we are thinking in parallel by the way about a study in Africa with the same kind of approach, (but) it doesn’t prevent us from being able to think about a study in Europe and Australia at the same time,” Dr Camille Locht, from the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM) said in agreement. 

Africans from all walks of life including football legends, Didier Drodga and Samuel Eto’o, have condemned the “racist comments” of the French doctors. 

Ivory Coast football legend Didier Drodga said in a Twitter post  “Africa isn’t a testing lab”, and denounced “the demeaning, false and most of all deeply racists words”. 

While Cameroonian football star Samuel Eto’o called the doctors “assassins”. 

A French anti-racism group also condemned the doctors and a Moroccan lawyers’ collective had said it would sue the doctors for racial defamation.