AstraZeneca vaccines and U.S. President Joe Biden. Photo collage: pnl/politico/marca he United States will soon be facing a dilemma—one that the Philippines wishes it had. As of this writing, America has fully vaccinated almost a hundred million of its citizens against COVID-19. That is nearly thirty percent of the entire population. Given the scale of their vaccination program under President Joe Biden, the country is well on its way to achieving "herd immunity" and inoculating all Americans who want to get vaccinated. With demand for vaccinations tapering off, the United States is in the enviable position to have more COVID-19 vaccines than they need. In fact, it has sixty million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine already on order, even though that drug has yet to receive "emergency use authorization" from the Centers for Disease Control. With the Philippines' vaccination rate still hovering between one and two percent, this late in the pandemic, the country could use some, if not all, of those sixty million doses the U.S. will get. This creates an excellent opportunity for U.S. President Joe Biden to show President Rodrigo Duterte that he is a better "friend" than China's Xi Jinping. China plans to donate around a million doses. If America instead donates millions more AstraZeneca vaccinations, Duterte might turn away from China and move closer to the U.S. Of course, Duterte's detractors say that will never happen. They believe Duterte was a Chinese "plant" all along—a real-life "Manchurian Candidate" whose rise to power was planned and orchestrated by Beijing. Unfortunately, these detractors offer no proof to back this claim. Either way, Filipinos will benefit from any help America and other countries can offer. With COVID-19 cases rising daily, any outside help will be greatly appreciated. Most Filipinos continue to rank the United States positively compared to China. That will likely continue and even improve with every dose America sends our way. Published 5/3/2021