Briefing UN Member States on Thursday, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus drew attention to a $27 billion financing gap in the ACT Accelerator, which supports the development and equitable distribution of coronavirus tests, treatments and vaccines globally.
“The longer this gap goes unmet, the harder it becomes to understand why, given this is a tiny fraction of the trillions of dollars that have been mobilized for stimulus packages in G20 countries”, he said.
Secondly, noting some bilateral deals, he called on all States “to respect COVAX contracts and not compete with them”.
And third, Tedros underscored the need for “an urgent scale-up in manufacturing to increase the volume of vaccines” with “innovative partnerships” to include tech transfer, licensing and “other mechanisms to address production bottlenecks”.
COVID swells in Africa
Meanwhile, as Africa marks one year since its first COVID-19 case, on 14 February, WHO revealed that last month, the