The World Health Organization (WHO) regional director for Africa said today that the continent needs 700 million doses of the covid-19 vaccine to reach the target of 30% coverage by the end of the year.
Matshidiso Moeti was speaking during the African Union Centre for Disease Control and Prevention’s (Africa CDC) weekly conference on pandemic developments on the continent, during which she expressed satisfaction with some “positive signs” on vaccination.
In this regard, he said that during the last week, were delivered to 13 African countries, through the mechanism COVAX (which aims the purchase and subsequent distribution of vaccines for the poorest countries) 3.8 million doses of vaccines, which brings to 82 million doses delivered in the region.
“These recently delivered vaccines are part of the 60 million doses allocated to 49 African countries that are expected to be shipped by September.
Despite these numbers, Matshidiso Moeti stressed that Africa still needs more than 700 million doses to reach the goal of 30% coverage by the end of the year.
Moeti also said that COVAX has signed agreements with Sinopharm and Sinovac (China) to supply 110 million doses to low-income countries, of which 32.5 million will be arriving in the continent.
“COVAX is confident of meeting its goal of supplying at least 520 million doses to Africa by the end of 2021,” he said.
Moeti further advised countries to mobilize resources, including financial, for vaccine-related activities, such as logistics or personnel, in order to reach as many people as possible, given the expected flow of vaccines.
And he said WHO has deployed more than 700 staff and advisors to support national authorities in the response to covid-19.
