With a deep focus on the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines around the world, governments may have to throw away more than 100 million doses if they are not distributed to poor countries immediately.
Data released on Monday by Airfinity, a consulting firm in the pharmaceutical sector, showed that more than 100 million vaccines are due to expire by the end of the year. Calculations show that G7 countries and the European Union will have 1 billion more vaccines by the end of 2021 and 10% of them will be eliminated.
The alert comes on the eve of the United Nations General Assembly and will have the issue of vaccine distribution as one of its central points. Today, 75% of all vaccines administered in the world were in just ten countries. In Africa, the continent received only 2% of all world production.
The WHO expected that by the end of September all countries in the world had vaccinated at least 10% of their population. But the goal will not be achieved.
The problem by numbers is that there is no shortage of vaccines. And yes there is a deep flaw in its distribution.
Even though 100 million doses are shipped to the poorest countries, many governments require at least two months to be able to use each one.
“Once this two-month validity period is considered, the number of doses potentially wasted reaches 241 million by the end of 2021, which is a quarter of the surplus stock of the G7 and the EU. represents”, warns the consultancy.
According to the survey, available vaccines in G7 countries and the European Union are enough for the poorest countries to vaccinate 70% of their population by May 2022.
“Airfinity estimates that the global total COVID-19 cases will likely exceed 400 million by the middle of 2022 and that immediate redistribution of vaccines could potentially prevent approximately 1 million deaths from the virus over that time period,” they tell.
For Airfinity CEO Rasmus Bech Hansen, “The world has seen two extraordinary scientific achievements in the pandemic: rapid development of highly effective vaccines and unprecedented growth in production.”
“For the world to take full advantage of it, our data shows we need a third, equally unprecedented achievement: a massive, rapid, globally coordinated, science-driven vaccination campaign,” They said.
The analysis comes ahead of the World Vaccine Summit to be chaired by the US President, Joe Biden, on Wednesday 22 September. At the event, the US will propose the goal of immunizing 70% of the world’s population by September 2022.
The data was sent by WHO ambassador and former prime minister Gordon Brown to other world leaders, including Joe Biden. Meanwhile, Global Justice Now warned that wasting millions of vaccine doses would be an “atrocity”.
