Indigenous vaccines to save donations of expiring Covid vaccines.

By Ben Musanje

18^th Nov 2021

Experts believe that African countries can overcome the issue of Covid-19 vaccine donations of which some arrive with limited shelf life from Western Countries, only once they promote manufacturing indigenous vaccine products.

Months ago, COVAX Facility allocated 60 million doses to 49 African countries including Uganda from the wealthy nations which had vaccinated substantial amounts of their populations.

But some African nations faced challenges in rolling out doses in timely manner due to shipment delays and financing issues which resulted to wastage of about 450,000 doses on the continent.

Asia Russell, the Executive Director for Health Global Access Project (GAP) says that six countries in Africa are already actively manufacturing vaccines which is to help bridge the gap of 11 billion doses needed to fully vaccinate at least 6.7% of the population in the continent.

Russell was delivering her virtual speech at the cross-border media science cafe for journalists from Uganda, Kenya, Zambia and Zimbabwe on Thursday.

Patrick Tippo, the Head of Science and Innovation (Biovac) who is so the Executive Director African Vaccine Manufacturing Initiative (AVMI) says that the recently launched Partnership for Africa Vaccine Manufacturing -PAVM by the African Union -AU will solve the global shortages in supplies of vaccines once the government on the continent step forward and take the initiative.