JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (CU)_The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the need to ensure access to quality healthcare, particularly in the African continent whose defense mechanism against external shocks has proven to be ineffective. Over the past two years, countries across the region have been struggling with Coronavirus vaccinations, with a host of challenges including vaccine storage issues, poor health infrastructure and a lack of funding for training and deploying medical staff having played a part. Against this backdrop, the African Development Bank (AfDB) is looking to support the continent’s vaccine manufacturing capacity and to strengthen its healthcare system.
The President of the AfDB, Akinwumi Adesina, participated in the 35th African Union Summit on Saturday, during which he disclosed the institution’s intention to invest $3 billion to ensure Africa’s 1.4 billion people gain greater access to quality healthcare. The funds will be directed towards three strategic priorities, namely, increasing the capacity of vaccine manufacturing, developing the continent’s pharmaceutical industry and building quality healthcare infrastructure.
According to data collected by Bloomberg, just over 10.2 billion doses of COVID vaccines have been administered across 184 countries in the region. This is owing to the fact that vaccine distribution across the globe have been lopsided over the past couple of years, with countries with the highest incomes vaccinating its populations more than 10 times faster than those with the lowest. “About 16 Africa countries have vaccinated less than five per cent and three countries have fully vaccinated less than two per cent,” Matshidiso Moeti the World Health Organisation’s Regional Director for Africa, said at a recent conference.
African scientists are of the view that challenges associated with accessing COVID vaccines may be tackled by investing in the local production of the jabs. Currently, only 1 per cent of the vaccines administered are being manufactured by the continent of over 1.4 billion people. The remaining 99 per cent are imported. Health experts believe that there would be dire consequences for Africa’s health security if no urgent action is taken, as the population across the region is expected to double by 2050.
