Half of the funding goes to subsidize purchases of vaccine doses for 92 poor and developing countries by COVAX, the global effort to provide equitable vaccine access led by Gavi and two other organizations. The remaining $ 2 billion will be allocated over the next two years to expand vaccine production and delivery, and the first $ 500 million is expected to be released soon. The administration hopes that donation will encourage other countries to contribute more to the effort, which they say will cost $ 15 billion.
Why it matters: The Biden government announced last month that it would participate in COVAX, reversing former President Donald Trump’s refusal to join the program because of his commitment to the World Health Organization. At the time, however, it was not clear when the United States would be able to donate its own vaccine supply.
Poor countries and global health advocates are pushing wealthy countries to share their supplies and warn that unfair vaccination can make them catch up for years. If experts believe that a large number of infections around the world could continue, it would probably also cause new virus variants. It could threaten to prolong the pandemic for rich and poor countries.
However, richer countries that have captured the majority of available vaccine doses have focused on vaccinating their citizens first, as they are under pressure to speed up efforts. The Biden government official made it clear on a Thursday background call that the priority is to vaccinate Americans.
‘While at the moment we cannot share the vaccination of vaccines, while we are focused on US vaccinations and shooting guns here, we are working hard to support COVAX to strengthen global vaccination worldwide and the timeline for when “We will have sufficient supplies in the United States and be able to donate excess vaccines,” the official said.
The Biden government has said it will have enough vaccine doses for all Americans by the end of July, though it will take longer to complete vaccinations.
Global vaccine anxiety: French President Emmanuel Macron announced in an interview on Thursday that he hopes to persuade Biden and other G7 leaders to commit to immediately sharing 3 to 5 percent of their vaccine supply with poorer countries.
Macron said he was concerned about the ‘war of influence over vaccines’ caused by China and Russia donating doses of their own vaccines to poor countries. White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters last week that the government in Biden was “watching the actions with concern”.
India has also recently started donating and selling doses of vaccines produced domestically to poor countries that do not have access to other shots.
The Biden administration believes that supporting COVAX ‘is one of the best ways to expand access to Covid vaccines,’ the Biden official said, pointing out that the global effort only works with compliant vaccines. the WHO standards for safety and effectiveness. So far, the WHO has not yet given permission for emergency use of the Russian and Chinese manufactured vaccines, which has questions about their effectiveness rates. A decision on the vaccines produced by Sinovac and Sinopharm in China is expected in the earliest month.
The WHO has given emergency permission to the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine and that of AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. The first dose of COVAX is expected to arrive in dozens of countries next week. COVAX organizers aim to deliver 2 billion doses by the end of this year, focusing on vaccinating health workers and the most vulnerable.