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In the midst of the global battle for the purchase of anti-Covid vaccines, Africa, so far lagging behind to immunize its 1.3 billion inhabitants, is accelerating and ensuring that it has guaranteed hundreds of millions of doses for the continent.
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Only a handful of African countries have started vaccinating their populations so far, including Egypt, Seychelles and Mauritius. And in Morocco, King Mohammed VI was vaccinated on Thursday, kicking off the national campaign.
Most countries on the continent rely on the World Health Organization (WHO) and the African Union (AU) for supplies. Thanks to the devices of the two organizations, WHO expects 30% of the African population to be vaccinated by the end of 2021.
The AU said on Thursday it had obtained 400 million additional doses. In total, 670 million vaccines are promised to Africa by the Union.
These 400 million doses were acquired from the Serum Institute of India (SII), which produces at high speed vaccines developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, for India and much of the developing world. .
The WHO Covax system, for equitable access to vaccines, will simultaneously provide doses for 20% of the population.
“By March, we will certainly see most countries start vaccinating,” said Richard Mihigo, coordinator of the immunization program and vaccine development at the WHO regional office for Africa on Thursday.
“It’s a slow start, but we expect things to accelerate in the coming months,” he added at an online press conference.
Since the start of the pandemic, Africa has officially remained one of the continents least affected by the virus, with 3.5 million cases and 88,000 deaths, according to an AFP count.
But most countries on the continent are hit by a second wave that has forced them to return to strict health measures. Infections have increased by 50% in the past four weeks and the number of deaths has doubled, according to the WHO.
And the discovery of new variants, in South Africa and Great Britain, deemed to be more contagious and which continue to spread around the world, has also accelerated the rush for vaccines.
– “Historic effort” –
The latest, Senegal announced Thursday that it had detected the British variant for the first time. With nearly 26,000 cases including 614 official deaths in this young but poor country, the pandemic is straining the health system.
Africa will need 1.5 billion doses to immunize 60% of its population and achieve herd immunity, it is estimated. For a cost which oscillates between 5.8 and 8.2 billion euros.
All vaccines will be available “between this year and next year,” promised the agency director of the African Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) at the AU, John Nkengasong. “A historic effort”.
At the same time, some governments have entered into bilateral negotiations with pharmaceutical companies to obtain more vaccines, at the risk of driving up prices.
The continent’s leading industrial power, South Africa is due to receive “one million” doses on Monday, negotiated directly with the AstraZeneca laboratory, Minister of Health Zweli Mkhize announced on Wednesday.
The African country most affected by the virus, with more than 1.4 million cases and nearly 43,000 official deaths, has also guaranteed access to nine million vaccines from the Johnson & Johnson laboratory and will receive 12 million doses of Covax .
During the virtual summit in Davos this week, the South African head of state, Cyril Ramaphosa, lambasted the rich countries which “monopolize” the vaccines, indignant at the “vaccine nationalism”.
He called on those who can afford “up to four times what their population needs” to make excess doses available.
article keywords:
health, epidemic, vaccines, Africa, virus
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