PARIS– French President Emmanuel Macron joins several African leaders on Thursday to launch a planned $1 billion project to speed up vaccine distribution in Africaafter the coronavirus pandemic exposed huge inequalities in access to them.
The launch of the African Vaccine Manufacturing Accelerator, which will provide financial incentives to vaccine manufacturers, provided Macron with a momentary respite from domestic political concerns as legislative elections will take place on June 30th and July 7th.
Many African leaders and advocacy groups say Africa has been unfairly blocked from accessing COVID-19 treatment tools, vaccines and testing equipment — which many richer countries bought in large quantities — after the pandemic swept the world from 2020.
The WHO, advocacy groups and others want to help Africa better prepare for the next pandemic, which many health experts consider inevitable. When the coronavirus pandemic began, South Africa was the only country in Africa with the capacity to produce vaccines, officials say, and the continent produced a small fraction of all vaccines globally.
The WHO failed in its efforts to help countries agree on a “pandemic treaty” – to improve pandemic preparedness and response – before its annual meeting last month. The project was shelved largely due to disagreements over sharing information about the pathogens that cause epidemics and the high-tech tools used to combat them.
Thursday’s event in Paris also aims to help give a financial boost to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, a public-private partnership that helps get needed vaccines to developing countries around the world.
Gavi says the project aims to make up to $1 billion available over the next ten years to help boost Africa’s production base, improve global vaccine markets and improve preparedness and response to pandemics and outbreaks such as HIV, malaria, tuberculosis and COVID-19.
The Geneva-based alliance says the accelerator will inject funds into manufacturers in Africa once they reach regulatory and supply milestones, with the aim of using market forces to drive down prices and encourage upstream investment.
Officials say the project will explore issues such as technology transfer – which some Western countries have resisted with powerful pharmaceutical companies – as well as the possible creation of an African medicines agency and resolving regulatory obstacles faced in the patchwork of African legal systems.
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AP journalist Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed to this report.
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