The African Development Bank (AfDB) has announced a $3 billion investment to strengthen Africa’s capacity to manufacture covid-19 vaccines.
Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank, announced this at the 35th African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
According to Adesina, the monies will improve access to decent healthcare for the continent’s 1.4 billion people.
He stated that the continent still requires $484 billion over the next three years to address the socio-economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and support Africans’ economic recovery, but that the most important lesson learned from the pandemic for Africa is the need to build a defense mechanism against external shocks, particularly in the areas of healthcare and financial security.
According to Bloomberg, more than 10.2 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccination have been administered across 184 countries.
In total, 130 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered per 100 individuals around the world—but the vaccine distribution is imbalanced, with regions with the greatest incomes being vaccinated more than 10 times faster than those with the lowest.
Only 21 of Africa’s 54 countries have vaccinated at least 10% of their population.
“About 16 Africa countries have vaccinated less than five per cent and three countries have fully vaccinated less than two per cent,” the World Health Organisation (WHO), Regional Director for Africa, Matshidiso Moeti. said at a recent conference.
According to the WHO, Africa had received over 587 million COVID-19 vaccination doses as of February 3, 2022.
About 58% of vaccinations were given through the COVAX Facility, 36% through bilateral agreements, and 6% through the African Union’s Africa Vaccines Acquisition Trust (AVAT).
Ms Moeti stated that six million individuals in Africa are vaccinated on average every week, and that this figure needs to rise to 36 million in order to meet the worldwide target of 70% vaccination coverage.
During the meeting, Adesina stated that Africa requires $600 million to $1.3 billion to achieve its objective of 60% vaccine production by 2040.
“Africa is still battling with basic shots,” he added, adding that while developed countries have moved on to booster shots.
“We must learn from this experience, Your Excellencies.” “Africa can no longer rely on the goodwill of outsiders to secure the lives of its 1.4 billion people,” he stated.
Be the first to comment