Health

Scaling up COVID-19 vaccines manufacturing capacity is critical, but is it possible?

April 27, 2021

Global

EIU COVID-19 Health Funding Tracker

April 27, 2021

Global
Anelia Boshnakova

Senior information specialist, Health Policy and Clinical Evidence

Anelia is a senior information specialist and health policy analyst in the Health Policy and Clinical Evidence team. Her areas of expertise are evidence-based medicine and health policy and systems research. Before joining the EIU, Anelia worked as a senior information specialist at Bazian, and previously at University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Anelia holds a master’s degree in Library and Information Science from Syracuse University.

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Many schemes have been floated to increase manufacturing capacity for COVID-19 vaccines across the globe, an idea strongly supported by the WTO and the WHO.

It’s been just three months since the first COVID-19 vaccines were authorised by the WHO for emergency use globally. By 8 April, had received 38 million doses funded through the . The launch of the COVAX initiative has been a great success of international cooperation, but now it is also clear that the limited manufacturing capacity is a real challenge. An published in January estimated that vaccines would not reach most of the poorer economies until 2023 or even 2024. What’s more, vaccine manufacturing is unevenly distributed across the world, leaving even rich countries such as , with severely reduced vaccine supplies. As a result, is seen as a priority by regulators and policymakers in Europe and elsewhere.

In the last few months different proposals have emerged from multilateral organisations such as the and the , as well as academics, researchers and public campaigns suggesting a range of solutions. These include high income countries , pharmaceutical companies for COVID-19 vaccines and/or to set up manufacturing facilities in different regions such as Africa and South America. This will not only increase vaccine production in the short term but will also improve .

The world faces two questions: what are the costs if the vaccination rollout is delayed until 2024? And what will it take to make these proposals work?

 

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