COVID-19: WHO says 'real hope' for vaccine 'cannot be overstated', backs fair distribution

On November 24, the World Health Organisation Director-General stated, that the positive results from vaccine trials were a “light at the end of this long, dark tunnel” but the significance of the scientific achievement “cannot be overstated”. At a press briefing, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stressed that while nations have set “a new standard for vaccine development”, there’s a need for the international community to “set a new standard for access” as well. Tedros emphasized the challenges of distribution of the COVID-19 vaccines to the world population, an integral part to end the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Further noting that no vaccine had been developed as rapidly, and citing fears that the wealthiest countries might yield to these resources leaving poorest and most vulnerable countries behind, Tedros said, poor nations might get “trampled in the stampede for vaccines.” He added, “The urgency with which vaccines have been developed must be matched by the same urgency to distribute them fairly”. Furthermore, Tedros asserted that the US $4.3 billion in funding in 2020, and the additional US $23.8 billion next year was urgently needed for the mass procurement and distribution of the vaccines globally.

"The International Monetary Fund estimates that if medical solutions can be made available faster and more widely," the WHO chief said, adding, "this could lead to a cumulative increase in global income of almost US $9 trillion by the end of 2025."

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Meanwhile, Tedros stressed that the WHO and its partners established the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator in the month of April for fair distribution of these vaccines to the developing nations. “The ACT Accelerator has supported the fastest, most coordinated and successful global effort in history to develop vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics”, the WHO chief said. WHO director general’s remarks came after Oxford’s AstraZeneca announced that its experimental COVID-19 vaccine has proven to be 70 percent effective on an average, following Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccine announcements earlier this month.

Comparatively 'cheaper' 

In a press release, AstraZeneca presented results from 23,000 participants in its Phase 3 trial that turned back positive news. The pharmaceutical giant conducted vaccine trials in collaboration with the University of Oxford, UK. While the AstraZeneca vaccine may be less effective, the candidate is comparatively cheaper than Moderna and the Pfizer and BioNTech consortium’s mRNA vaccines that have proven 95 percent efficacy. 

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