WHO urges delay to Covid booster shots as shortages hit lower-income countries
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The World Health Organization has called for a global moratorium on booster shots until at least the end of September amid a severe shortage of vaccines in lower-income countries, where at-risk populations remain vulnerable to Covid-19.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the WHO, told reporters on Wednesday that the Geneva-based health body was calling for the delay to allow at least 10 per cent of people in every country in the world to be vaccinated.
“To make that happen, we need everyone’s co-operation, especially the handful of countries and companies that control the global supply of vaccines,” he said.
The WHO wants to have 40 per cent of the world vaccinated by the end of the year, and get to 70 per cent by mid-2022. In higher-income nations, more than half of the population has already received at least one shot, the WHO said. In low-income countries, the figure hovers just above 1 per cent.
Pfizer, which last month raised 2021 revenue forecasts for the vaccine it makes with Germany’s BioNTech by nearly a third to $33.5bn, has said booster shots will be needed earlier than thought to counter Covid caused by the Delta variant which is far more infectious than the ancestral strain of coronavirus. Cases have been increasing globally for weeks, but recent and incomplete data suggest they are plateauing.
Health experts and global regulators are still divided on the issue, though evidence suggests a shortened period of immunity, especially in more vulnerable subgroups, against Covid caused by the Delta variant.
Along with Moderna, Pfizer has raised prices for its latest EU supply deals, the Financial Times reported on Sunday, after the bloc signed a deal for up to 2.1bn shots through 2023 to tackle the pandemic and any new variants. The WHO’s Mariângela Simão, the assistant director-general for access to medicines, said increased efficiency in their production lines “would, in a normal market situation, lead to a decreased price, not increase in price”.
“What we have clearly is a market where the demand is very high in comparison with the production and WHO urges companies to keep prices down . . . There are many countries around the world that cannot afford any higher price right now,” she said. “It’s urgent that we think about this in terms of affordable pricing, in times where there is an increased manufacturing from those two mRNA producers.”
In countries where vaccination rates are high, such as the UK, new waves of infections caused by the fast-spreading Delta variant have been less severe, with fewer hospitalisations and deaths. But where coverage is lower, Covid continues to cause a significant number of hospitalisations and fatalities.
Some nations with very high vaccine coverage, such as Israel, have begun administering booster shots to vulnerable people. Other high-income countries, including the US, UK and nations in the EU, have signalled that they are likely to start offering booster shots to at least vulnerable people in the autumn.
The WHO has since the beginning of the pandemic called for solidarity in tackling the virus. But its initiatives, including ones to share intellectual property to enable large-scale manufacturing of vaccines globally, have faced resistance, especially from the pharmaceuticals industry.