×

Our award-winning reporting has moved

Context provides news and analysis on three of the world’s most critical issues:

climate change, the impact of technology on society, and inclusive economies.

Most poorer countries do not have enough COVAX shots to continue vaccinations: WHO

by Reuters
Monday, 21 June 2021 16:59 GMT

A pack of AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccines is seen as the country receives its first batch of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccines under COVAX scheme, at the international airtport of Accra, Ghana February 24, 2021. REUTERS/Francis Kokoroko

Image Caption and Rights Information

A WHO adviser said well over half of poorer countries would not have enough vaccines to sustain programmes and some had completely ran out

GENEVA, June 21 (Reuters) - More than half of poorer countries receiving doses via the COVAX vaccine-sharing programme do not have enough supplies to continue, an official from the World Health Orgnization which co-runs it said on Monday.

"I would say of the 80 AMC countries at least well over a half of them would not have sufficient vaccine to be able to sustain their programmes right now," WHO senior adviser Bruce Aylward told a briefing, referring to an advance market commitment to low and middle-income countries, saying the actual portion was probably "much higher".

Some of them had completely ran out, he added.

The shortages, caused partly by manufacturing delays and Indian supply disruptions, come as cases and deaths increase across Africa as part of a third wave of infections.

(Reporting by Alexander Winning, Emma Farge and Stephanie Nebehay)

-->