The death toll due to Covid marked an alarming increase during June in Africa, despite the country receiving a shipment of 100,000 doses of Pfizer. The tradition seemed to confirm the fact that the UN-backed program to immunize the world’s population could provide access to vaccines even in less developed countries.
Five weeks later, however, the Chadian Ministry of Health announced that 94,000 doses were not used. In Benin, only 267 people are vaccinated every day. The pace is so slow that 110.00 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine have expired as they have not been used.
According to some documents, doses intended for the poor risk expiring during the summer. These figures show perhaps the greatest difficulty the global immunization program is facing.
Known as COVAX, the program was promoted as a multibillion-dollar global alliance with the participation of international organizations that wanted to ensure that poor countries also had access to anti-Covid vaccines.
But another 500 million doses were needed to reach the goal. But the longer the virus circulates, the more dangerous it will be, even for vaccinated citizens of rich countries.
If organizations are not funded, new variants will continue to spread, endangering all countries of the world. “COVAX has not failed yet, but the situation is not as we expected,” said Dr. Ayoade Alakija, part of the vaccine program.
“We have no choice.” For the good of humanity, COVAX must succeed. “Supporters and critics of the program have agreed that the program needs some improvements, reports abcnews.al
One of the ways is to buy refrigerators to store vaccines at the right temperatures, as in many African countries there are shortages.
