- Canada is the only G7 country due to vaccines during early deliveries of the COVAX scheme.
- COVAX is focused on poorer countries, and most rich countries buy vaccines separately.
- Canada has had a rock-like rollout, with critics opposing it, saying Canadians are the ‘highest priority’.
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Canada is not backing down after receiving criticism over taking some of the vaccines from the COVAX program, which distributes vaccines to poorer countries.
COVAX raises funding from richer countries to distribute vaccines around the world, among poorer countries, many of which have yet to be vaccinated.
The plan for the first round of distribution of these vaccines was announced on Wednesday, including the award of Canada.
COVAX plans to deliver more than 330 million doses of AstraZeneca / Oxford and Pfizer vaccines in the first half of 2021.
The vaccines must be distributed among 145 countries, including 92 low- and middle-income countries. The number of doses is enough to cover about 3.3% of the population in the countries.
As of Friday, Canada has already vaccinated about 2.7% of its population, according to figures from Our World in Data.
The pace is far ahead of most COVAX recipients, but is behind countries with similar national wealth as Canada, including the US, the UK and most of the EU.
Ultimately, COVAX aims to deliver doses to at least 20% of the population in recipient countries, but the supply issues mean that it will take many months to meet the promise, and that richer countries are almost guaranteed to reach that level much sooner. to reach.
Other richer countries, such as New Zealand, also receive vaccinations from COVAX. But Canada is the only G7 member listed to receive COVAX vaccine in this first round of vaccine distribution.
Canada is predicted to receive a total of 1.9 million doses of the AstraZeneca / Oxford vaccine.
Karina Gould, Canada’s International Development Minister, spoke to the Canadian network CBC News on Wednesday.
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She said Canada had contributed $ 440 million to COVAX, and that half of it was destined to buy doses for Canadians. The other half of the money was for low- and middle-income countries, she said.
“It was part of the strategy from the start,” she said. “Our top priority is to ensure that Canadians have access to vaccines.”
The move comes after concerns were expressed about “vaccine nationalism”, with richer countries storing the vaccines while poorer countries scramble to get their own supplies.
President Joe Biden’s government said on Tuesday that the US would join COVAX, although the scope of its contribution was unclear.
Oxfam has criticized Canada’s decision to use early COVAX vaccinations, which it said was motivated by political pressure at home. Canada has struggled to gain access to vaccines quickly, despite giving 40 million doses of the Moderna vaccine and the 76 million doses of Pfizer one.
Dr. Jason Nickerson, a humanitarian adviser at Médecins Sans Frontières, told Yahoo! Wednesday that Canada ‘jumped the line’.
He said the effect of his decision was that low-risk people in Canada would get vaccines ahead of high-risk people elsewhere, a situation he calls “honestly indefensible.”