U.S. Covid-19 Vaccine Donation to Boost Developing World's Pandemic Fight -- Update
10 Junio 2021 - 06:33PM
Noticias Dow Jones
By Gabriele Steinhauser and Saeed Shah
A plan to revive a stumbling campaign to get Covid-19 vaccines
to developing countries got a critical boost from U.S. plans to
donate 500 million shots developed by BioNTech SE and Pfizer Inc.
by next June, part of an expected announcement by a group of world
leaders that they will provide one billion doses.
While rich countries in North America and Europe have largely
immunized their high-risk citizens and are now moving to vaccinate
teenagers ahead of the new school year, many poor nations are
facing new surges in infections with little protection. In Africa,
for instance, just 0.6% of the population has been fully
vaccinated, compared with 42% in the U.S.
The developing world has emerged as the focal point of the
pandemic, with infections and deaths reaching new records in recent
months in part because of low vaccination rates.
After the U.S. said it would donate the 500 million doses,
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's office said Thursday that
the U.K. will donate 100 million surplus vaccine doses to the rest
of the world within the next year. Those commitments are part of at
least one billion doses world leaders are expected to say they will
provide "through dose sharing and financing and set out a plan to
expand vaccine manufacturing in order to achieve that goal," Mr.
Johnson's office said ahead of the Group of Seven summit.
Health officials in developing countries said ahead of the
summit that they hope the 500 million doses due to be donated by
the U.S. will encourage other rich governments to step up. The
announcement "is a monumental step forward" in the global effort to
get vaccines to poor countries, said Matshidiso Moeti, the World
Health Organization's director for the Africa region. "We are now
seeing wealthy nations starting to turn promises into action."
President Biden said the U.S. isn't perfect but steps up in
times of need. He also acknowledged it was in America's public
health and economic interests to donate the vaccines.
"As long as the virus rages elsewhere, there is a risk of new
mutations that could threaten our people," he said. "We know that
raging COVID-19 in other countries holds back global growth, raises
instability and weakens governments."
Deliveries of the U.S.'s donated shots will start in August and
reach 200 million doses by the end of the year, the two companies
said Thursday. The remaining 300 million doses are due to be
shipped by June 2022.
How to close the global vaccination gap, caused largely by rich
governments buying up much of the supply for 2021, is set to be at
the center of talks among leaders of the Group of Seven leading
economies starting Friday. Mr. Johnson, who is hosting the summit,
has called on the G-7 leaders to commit to vaccinating the entire
world by the end of 2022.
The August deliveries of the Pfizer-BioNTech shots will help
plug an immediate gap of 250 million vaccines faced this summer by
the WHO-backed Covax initiative, which aims to get Covid-19 shots
to 30% of adults in the world's poorest countries by early 2022.
The U.S. has previously said that it would share 80 million
vaccines with other countries, including through Covax, by the end
of this month.
A spokeswoman for Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which helps run
Covax, said it "welcomes this important contribution to Covax,
which will see more vaccines put to work protecting some of the
most vulnerable people in the world."
Covax has struggled to keep up shipments since March, when the
Indian government imposed an export ban on its main supplier, the
Serum Institute of India, which is making a vaccine developed by
AstraZeneca Inc. and the University of Oxford. India has diverted
the vaccines to inoculate its own population in an effort to slow a
devastating outbreak at home. Many of the 92 countries most
dependent on Covax have yet to finish immunizing healthcare
workers, tens of millions of whom are waiting to receive a second
AstraZeneca dose in the coming weeks.
The donation of the Pfizer doses reflects a broader shift in
U.S. vaccination policy. Washington has so far kept a tight lid on
the export of shots, a stance that has been criticized by its
European allies and developing countries. Pfizer said Thursday that
it expects the 500 million doses to come from its manufacturing
facilities in the U.S. and that it is selling the vaccine at what
it called a not-for-profit price.
Biden administration officials said the 500 million shots will
cost about $3.5 billion, with the contract due to be finalized in
the coming weeks. That suggests a price of $7 a dose, far below the
$19.50 the U.S. paid in its previous supply deal. About $2 billion
of the overall cost will be covered by the administration's
previous $4 billion commitment to Covax. An additional $1.5 billion
will come from money included in the coronavirus-relief law Mr.
Biden signed earlier this year.
The International Monetary Fund and other multilateral agencies
estimated this month that it will cost $50 billion to vaccinate at
least 60% of the population in developing countries in an effort to
end the pandemic by mid-2022. That includes investments needed to
build out the infrastructure to effectively roll out Covid-19 shots
in poor countries as well as new manufacturing capacity and should
help cover some of the costs of Covid-19 tests and treatments and
other public-health measures.
G-7 leaders are expected to make new announcements on how to
raise those funds at their summit.
A shift from the relatively easy-to-store AstraZeneca shot in
the global inoculation effort to the Pfizer-BioNTech shot adds new
urgency to raising more funds. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine needs to
be stored in sophisticated freezers that can keep it at minus 70
degrees Celsius, which aren't commonly available in many developing
countries.
John Nkengasong, the director of the Africa Centres for Disease
Control and Prevention, said Thursday he was confident that the
Pfizer shot could be rolled out in major African cities, where
electricity supply is more reliable. "My position has always been:
If you give me Pfizer shots I will use them on the continent," he
said.
Write to Gabriele Steinhauser at gabriele.steinhauser@wsj.com
and Saeed Shah at saeed.shah@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 10, 2021 19:23 ET (23:23 GMT)
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