Wednesday, September 22, 2021

Vaccine Hoarding

 According to Human Rights Watch, 75% of Covid vaccines have gone to 10 countries. The Economist Intelligence Unit have calculated that half of all of the vaccines made so far have gone to 15% of the world's population, the world's richest countries administering 100 times as many shots as the poorest.

In June, members of the G7 - Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States - pledged to donate one billion doses to poor countries over the next year.

"I smiled when I saw that," says Agathe Demarais, lead author of a recent report on global vaccines supply at the Economist Intelligence Unit and a former diplomat. "I used to see this a lot. You know it's never going to happen."


The UK promised 100m of that pledge, so far it has donated just under nine million. President Biden pledged 580m of which the US has delivered 140m so far. And the EU bloc promised 250m doses by the end of the year - it has sent about 8% of those.


The world's richest countries could have 1.2bn doses that they don't need - even if they start administering boosters.


A fifth of those doses - 241 million vaccines - could be at risk of going to waste if they are not donated very soon.


Covid vaccine stockpiles: Could 241m doses go to waste? - BBC News


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