(Newser)
– As good news continues to spread about coronavirus efforts in the United States, including an agreement reported by the Biden administration that got 200 million more doses for Americans, things are not progressing as well in many parts of the world. In fact, UNICEF says 130 countries have not yet administered a single dose for NPR, leaving 2.5 billion people out of the cold and highlighting the huge gap between rich and poorest nations. Factors underlying the problem include a lack of sufficient vaccines to do so, as well as possible problems with current vaccine candidates in the fight against COVID-19 variants. South Africa, for example, has pivoted on the Johnson & Johnson AstraZeneca vaccine, an easy-to-store and relatively inexpensive vaccine that low-resource countries were using, because it was found that the latter was not so effective in preventing COVID caused by variant B.1.351 which now prevails in South Africa.
The drug maker Moderna has already secured most of the initial supply of vaccines to richer countries, according to the Washington Post, and other companies remain the same, leaving the poorest countries desperate for any vaccine, even those that are not as effective. The World Health Organization projects that these troubled nations may not have widespread access to the vaccine until the end of 2022 or even 2023, for USA Today. To help these countries, the WHO has helped launch COVAX, a vaccination program that seeks to ensure that the world’s poorest nations get 20% of their populations (mostly the elderly and health workers) inoculated by the end of the world. ‘year. “That way, you avoid what … would be unethical and unconscious,” a South African doctor told the newspaper. And also a dangerous thing, Jeremy Farrar, head of the charity Wellcome, tells Euronews: “Vaccinating a lot of people in a few countries, leaving the virus out of control in large parts of the world, will cause more variants to appear.” (Read more stories about the coronavirus vaccine).