GENEVA Pfizer announced Friday that it will
provide up to 40 million of its Covid-19 vaccine doses to poorer countries on
a non-profit basis, through the globally-pooled Covax facility.
While dozens of the world’s richer countries have begun their vaccination
campaigns in a bid to curb the pandemic, coronavirus jabs have been few and
far between in the world’s poorer nations.
Covax — the globally-pooled coronavirus vaccine procurement and equitable
distribution effort, aimed at ensuring that lower-income countries get hold
of doses too — is hoping to ship its first deliveries in February.
Covax is co-led by the World Health Organization and Gavi, the Vaccine
Alliance. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is the only one so far to have received
emergency use approval from the WHO.
Developing countries should have “the same access to vaccines as the rest
of the world”, Pfizer chairman Albert Bourla told a virtual press conference.
“We will provide the vaccine to Covax for these countries at a not-for-
profit basis.
“We are proud to have this opportunity to provide doses that will support
Covax’s efforts towards vaccinating health care workers at high risk of
exposure in developing countries, and other vulnerable populations.”
– Ready to roll –
Set up last year, Covax initially aimed to secure enough Covid-19 vaccines
this year for the most vulnerable 20 percent in participating countries.
In Covax, funding is covered through donations for the 92 lower- and
lower-middle income economies involved, while for richer countries, buying in
operates as a back-up insurance policy.
Gavi chief executive Seth Berkley said nearly 150 million doses of the
AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine were ready to ship through Covax — pending
emergency use approval from the WHO, which is on course to happen in mid-
February.
He said Covax should be able to deliver those doses in the first quarter
of 2021.
Covax still needs to finalise a supply agreement for the Pfizer-BioNTech
vaccine.
Berkley said Covax could procure 2.3 billion vaccine doses this year,
which, he said, would equate to close to 1.8 billion doses for the poorest 92
countries — enough to vaccinate about 27 percent of the population, an
upgrade on the initial target.
– ‘Science will win’ –
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said vaccines were
offering the hope of ending the pandemic and repairing the global economy.
However, “to do that, we need every member state, every partner, and every
vaccine producer on board”.
Speaking more broadly than Covax, Pfizer’s Bourla said he felt confident
that Pfizer-BioNTech could produce two billion Covid-19 vaccine doses by the
end of 2021.
“Science will win, and will win for everyone,” he said.
Asked about how many vaccine doses all manufacturers might be able to
produce this year, Gavi’s Berkley said: “I think we’re talking about numbers
in the range of six to seven billion doses”.
Doctors Without Borders said the 40 million doses offered to Covax by
Pfizer were a drop in the ocean and a lamentable “pittance” compared to the
direct deals it has struck with high-income countries.
“We call on pharmaceutical corporations like Pfizer and its peers to
supply the Covax facility with the volumes it needs at an at-cost price,” the
medical charity’s Dana Gill said in a statement.
“If the world is going to emerge from this pandemic, we absolutely must
distribute these vaccines equitably, not based upon who can pay the most.”