Vaccine Rollout Across the World, Does it Fix the Problem?

I am getting my second COVID vaccination on Friday. If you are reading this from China or the UK, you’re probably thinking, “Oh, I already have both my jabs.” On the other hand, if you are reading from Kenya or Venezuela, chances are that you might not have even had your first. So far, China and the US have administered the highest number of COVID vaccines. At the other end of the scale, countries like Haiti and Tanzania are still waiting for their first doses to arrive. 

How do countries differ?

The UK-based Financial Times maintains a global COVID vaccine tracker that is updated daily [1]. This comprehensive site has some great explanatory graphics – certainly worth a look if you are interested. At the time of writing this blog, the tracker reports that 2,417,701,150 vaccines have been given globally (based on data from 231 locations). Heading the league table, China has given 904.1 million vaccines, the US has given 582.6 million vaccines, and India has given 252.8 million vaccines. The UK, Germany, France, Italy, Mexico, Turkey and Brazil are also in the ‘top ten’. Israel, with its smaller population, has given only 10.6 million vaccines, but that has provided full vaccination (i.e. both doses of a two-dose regime) to nearly 60% of the Israeli population, which is a terrific achievement. 

Rates of vaccination coverage in different countries depend on the date when countries started national vaccination campaigns, and the rate at which those vaccines were rolled out. The UK, for example, began community vaccination in the second week of December 2020, while some countries did not begin their vaccine roll outs until April, and others still are yet to begin. Those that were first to the starting line were developed countries that were in a position to pre-order massive volumes of vaccines before they were even approved by the regulators. 

In fact, the data show very clearly that vaccine rollouts in advanced economies are largely outpacing those in emerging and developing economies — even in countries with similar death rates [1].

Why does this matter?

The huge disparity in vaccination rates across the world is having a continued social and economic impact on countries that already had weaker economies and less advantaged populations. Officials at the World Health Organization (WHO) have warned that the world is on the brink of “catastrophic moral failure” as poorer countries fall ever further behind. 

In addition, an inability to control the spread of the virus in these regions increases the chances of more new variants emerging, potentially undermining successful vaccination programmes in developed countries. Left unchecked, the virus could mutate into strains that are not affected by existing vaccines. 

These issues have prompted international efforts to donate COVID vaccines to poorer countries. Many are relying on deliveries from Covax, a scheme led by Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, together with the WHO and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), which is trying to ensure that everyone in the world has access to a COVID vaccine. In February this year, China pledged to donate 10 million vaccine doses to Covax and, earlier this month, leaders of the G7 countries meeting in the UK declared their intention to supply one billion vaccine doses, either directly or through the Covax scheme. 

So does that fix the problem?

Well, it’s certainly a start, but the problem goes beyond simple cost of supply. 

To begin with, the so-called ‘anti-vax movement’ has undermined the roll-out of vaccines in some communities. Highlighted as a concern in The Lancet [2] as early as October last year, it was noted that social media accounts held by anti-vaxxers had increased their following significantly since the start of the pandemic: 31 million people now follow anti-vaccine groups on Facebook, with 17 million people subscribing to similar accounts on a popular video channel. Nevertheless, more recent reports suggest that nearly 70% of the US population intends to get a COVID vaccine. According to Forbes, this is a striking difference to the EU, where only 36% of people say they ‘trust’ vaccines – apparently, only 40% of French people want the COVID vaccine [3]. Therefore, public health authorities in many countries, even those with ample supply of the vaccine, have these challenges to overcome.

Secondly, there are the practicalities of organising vaccine rollouts in countries lacking infrastructure and well-developed healthcare. This is especially true in countries where much of the population may be sparse and rural. These countries may need a lot of help in the design and management of their campaigns, and it is not clear how or whether this support is being provided. 

Thirdly, even in countries eager and ready to be vaccinated, there is a barrier caused by a worldwide shortage of vaccines. A shortage of supplies available to vaccinate everyone has led to widespread calls on manufacturers and healthcare supply companies to scale up production across the world. 

So what now?

As already predicted last year [4], thanks to the global necessity for treatments and vaccines for COVID, it seems that demand for facilities able to manufacture these products is going to outstrip capacity for a while to come, and investment in new bioreactor capacity, potentially including the latest continuous technologies, should probably be encouraged over the next few years. There are obvious challenges to setting up such facilities – the extremely high financial cost being just one – but for those who can afford to do it, return on investment seems almost guaranteed.

Meanwhile, public health authorities around the world will continue to roll out vaccination campaigns as quickly as possible. The UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson famously declared earlier this month that he wants the whole world vaccinated by 2022. This might seem a tall order, but it’s surely worth aiming for. Only then will we be able to prevent the spread of the virus around the world and, in doing so, restrict the emergence of more new variants and finally end this pandemic.

References

1.   Financial Times. Covid-19 vaccine tracker: the global race to vaccinate. Updated daily, https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker/

2.   Burki T. The online anti-vaccine movement in the age of COVID-19. The Lancet 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/S2589-7500(20)30227-2

3.   Cohen J. Covid-19 vaccine hesitancy is worse in EU than US. Forbes 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshuacohen/2021/03/08/covid-19-vaccine-hesitancy-is-worse-in-eu-than-us/?sh=76944dca611f

4.   Harding S. Global demand for COVID-19 products presents huge opportunities for the biomanufacturing sector. Pharmasources.com 2020, https://www.pharmasources.com/news/66037.html

Author biography

Sarah Harding, PhD

Editorial Director of Chemicals Knowledge

Sarah Harding worked as a medical writer and consultant in the pharmaceutical industry for 15 years, for the last 10 years of which she owned and ran her own medical communications agency that provided a range of services to blue-chip Pharma companies. She subsequently began a new career in publishing as Editor of Speciality Chemicals Magazine, and then Editorial Director at Chemicals Knowledge. She now focusses on providing independent writing and consultancy services to the pharmaceutical and speciality chemicals industry.