News Desk :
People living in poor countries are set to miss out Covid-19 vaccine as rich countries are hoarding more doses than they needed, a coalition of campaigning bodies warns.
The People’s Vaccine Alliance says nearly 70 lower-income countries will only be able to vaccinate one in 10 people.
This is despite Oxford-AstraZeneca pledging to provide 64% of its doses to people in developing nations.
Steps are being taken to ensure access to vaccines is fair around the globe.
This vaccine commitment, known as Covax, has managed to secure 700 million doses of vaccines to be distributed between the 92 lower-income countries that have signed up.
But even with this plan in place, the People’s Vaccine Alliance – a network of organisations including Amnesty International, Oxfam and Global Justice Now – says there is not enough to go round, and drug companies should share their technology to make sure more doses are produced.
Their analysis found that rich countries have bought enough doses to vaccinate their entire populations three times over if all the vaccines are approved for use.
Canada, for example, has ordered enough vaccines to protect each Canadian five times, it claims.
And even though rich nations represent just 14% of the world’s population, they have bought up 53% of all the most promising vaccines so far.
“No-one should be blocked from getting a life-saving vaccine because of the country they live in or the amount of money in their pocket,” said Anna Marriott, Oxfam’s health policy manager.
“But unless something changes dramatically, billions of people around the world will not receive a safe and effective vaccine for Covid-19 for years to come.”
The People’s Vaccine Alliance is calling on all pharmaceutical corporations working on Covid-19 vaccines to openly share their technology and intellectual property so that billions more doses can be manufactured and made available to everyone who needs them.
This can be done through the World Health Organization Covid-19 technology access pool, it says.
AstraZeneca, the company manufacturing the Covid vaccine developed by the University of Oxford, has committed to making it available on a not-for-profit basis to the developing world. It is cheaper than the others and can be stored at fridge temperatures, making it easier to distribute across the globe.
But campaigners say one company on its own cannot supply enough vaccines for the whole world.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has already received approval in the UK and the most vulnerable are starting to be vaccinated this week. It is likely to receive approval from regulators in the US and Europe soon, meaning it could be some time before it is shared with poorer nations.
Two other vaccines, from Moderna and Oxford-AstraZeneca, are awaiting regulatory approval in a number of countries.
The Russian vaccine, Sputnik, has also announced positive trial results, and four other vaccines are going through late-stage clinical trials.
According to research from Duke University, high-income countries have purchased a confirmed 3.8 billion doses. Upper middle-income nations have secured 829 million doses. And lower middle-income countries hold more than 1.7 billion doses. But the Duke researchers say they haven’t found evidence of direct deals for vaccine purchases from low-income countries. And even middle- to lower middle-income countries that do have some direct deals have not secured enough doses to vaccinate their whole populations.
In the absence of direct purchase deals, countries are relying on COVAX for vaccines. COVAX was launched to help get COVID-19 vaccines to all parts of the world by providing member countries equal access. It is an arm of the World Health Organization’s Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT).3
COVAX works in such a way that high- and middle-income nations that are part of the COVAX Facility commit to funding, and low-income countries in the alliance then get funded. In this way, self-funded countries can purchase different levels of vaccine coverage for residents, and lower-income countries will receive enough doses to vaccinate 20% of their populations.3
Most of the world’s population lives in countries that are part of the COVAX Facility, according to the Duke report.1 WHO lists 64 high-income countries that are part of COVAX, with the U.S. and China both notably absent from the list. And 92 low-income countries in the alliance are eligible for COVAX support.4
But with higher-income countries buying up doses through direct deals with pharmaceutical companies, COVAX could face vaccine shortages for lower-income nations, the Duke report says.
