Africa needs vaccines as second-shot deadline looms- WHO
African nations will need at least 20 million AstraZeneca Plc coronavirus vaccines by mid-July to complete the immunization of people who have had the first dose of the shots.
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World Health Organisation (WHO) regional director for Africa, Matshidiso Moeti, said this on Thursday during a virtual press briefing hosted by WHO Regional Office for Africa in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo.
Moeti said that the continent requires additional vaccine doses as a matter of urgency amid supply crunch that has stalled inoculation targeting high-risk groups.
“As supplies dry up, dose-sharing is an urgent, critical and short-term solution to ensuring that Africans at the greatest risk of COVID-19 get the much-needed protection,’’ Moeti said in a statement.
Statistics from Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the continent has acquired 43.5 million vaccine doses and has administered 28.2 million as of Wednesday.
While saying that an additional 200 million doses of any of the WHO emergency use listed COVID-19 vaccines are needed to immunise 10 per cent of African population by September.
Moeti said that he believes that the urgency to vaccinate a critical mass of the African population is informed by emergence of highly contagious variants that threaten to overrun already fragile health systems.
According to Moeti, the continent is staring at the possibility of new surges hence the need to speed up immunization of vulnerable segments of the population like the elderly and terminally ill.
She called upon wealthy nations to expedite donation of extra vaccine doses to the COVAX facility in order to enable African countries to fully immunize citizens.
Moeti said WHO is helping African countries to establish structures for facilitating domestic manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccines in the light of global supply crunch.
Moeti, said that 54 African countries have endorsed a resolution to strengthen local vaccine production through transfer of knowledge, technology and innovation alongside waiver of patents owned by multinational pharmaceutical firms.
MTO/Vanguard
