WHO Calls for $23.4 Billion to Combat Inequities in Accessing COVID-19 Vaccines

Geneva: A new strategy announced on Thursday by the World Health Organization (WHO) calls for $23.4 billion to combat inequities in accessing COVID-19 vaccines, tests and treatments.
 
According to the United Nations (UN) agency, the funding for the Access to COVID Tools (ACT) Accelerator – the UN-backed global initiative to end the COVID-19 pandemic - is critical to prevent some five million additional potential deaths as well as $5.3 trillion in global economic losses. 
 
"To end the pandemic, governments, manufacturers and donors must fully fund the ACT-Accelerator to address inequities in access to COVID-19 vaccines, tests and treatments," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a press release on Thursday.

According to him, the ACT-Accelerator is bolstering its role as an ally for countries side-lined by market forces in securing life-saving interventions. 
 
"Fully funding the ACT-Accelerator is a global health security imperative for us all – the time to act is now," he stated.
 
From research to rollout, the ACT-Accelerator remains the world’s only end-to-end solution for accelerating the development and fair distribution of COVID-19 tools. 
 
Through the COVAX pillar – led by Gavi, CEPI and WHO, alongside UNICEF as key delivery partner – and the Diagnostics pillar– led by FIND and the Global Fund– the ACT-Accelerator is working to address challenges of equitable access and to help the world meet the global targets of 70% vaccination coverage by mid-2022 and minimum testing rates of at least 1 per 1000 people per day in 2022.
 
Through the Therapeutics pillar – led by Unitaid and Wellcome – the ACT-Accelerator is working to provide treatments for up to 120 million COVID-19 cases expected in the next 12 months in low-income countries, lower middle-income countries and underserved upper middle-income countries, focused on equitable access to effective tools, including existing and potential new treatments and medical oxygen.
 
The ACT-Accelerator’s impact so far includes:
 
1. Delivering more than 425 million vaccine doses to 144 countries and territories through COVAX;
2. Halving the cost of COVID-19 rapid tests, transferring technology to low and middle-income countries, and delivering more than 128 million tests through the Diagnostics Consortium;
3. Increasing essential oxygen, personal protective equipment (PPE) and treatment supplies, including through the advance purchase of nearly 3 million doses of dexamethasone and more than US$4 billion worth of support from the Global Fund’s COVID-19 Response Mechanism (C19RM).
 
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