News & Analysis: Vaccine access and delivery
“According to CDC-Africa, the continent needs two billion doses in order to vaccinate 60% of the population to contain the pandemic… The challenge facing Africa is access: availability of the required vaccine doses and access to financing to make purchases.”
“At least 60 percent of Africa’s 1.2 billion people need to be immunized for a COVID-19 vaccination drive to prove effective, the head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday.”
“Africa’s top public health official has said “it will be extremely terrible to see” rich countries receiving COVID-19 vaccines while African countries go without it, especially as a new surge in cases begins on the continent of 1.3 billion people.”
“The Ugandan health ministry sparked quite a bit of confusion on Wednesday when it announced that it would allow Chinese residents in the country to import 4,000 doses of a COVID-19 vaccine from China to be used within their own community. The ministry said that the inoculations would only be available to Chinese residents living in an industrial zone outside of Kampala and no Ugandans would have access to the treatment. “
“Providing fair and equitable access to vaccines will be key to managing the health and economic repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“Actions that African governments take today will not only enable a sustainable and quality-assured supply of efficacious vaccines to fight the pandemic but will also help maintain public trust.”
“Nine out of 10 people in 70 low-income countries are unlikely to be vaccinated against COVID-19 next year because the majority of the most promising vaccines coming on-stream have been bought up by the west, campaigners have said.”
“John Nkengasong, director at the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, watched events unfolding in China with concern — long before the rest of the world had turned its attention to what was then just a mysterious outbreak of atypical pneumonia.”
“Kenya’s national carrier Kenya Airways is seeking to play a role in the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines in Africa. The airline is banking on its stature as a well connected airline in Africa to take the vaccines to every region on the continent using its networks and cargo routes.”
“Morocco is gearing up for an ambitious COVID-19 vaccination program, aiming to vaccinate 80% of its adults in an operation starting this month that’s relying initially on a Chinese vaccine that has not yet completed advanced trials to prove it is safe and effective.”
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