Growing Consensus Emerging At WTO – Strengthen Supply Chain & Tech Transfer To Expand Vaccine Access
A growing consensus seems to be emerging out of this week’s high-level WTO meeting that glaring inequities in access to vaccines can be remedied by strengthening supply chains, avoiding export bans across borders, and ensuring that big pharma voluntarily transfers its vaccine technologies to poorer countries so they can produce their own vaccines. “The significant […] Continue reading ->
IBADAN – The Africa CDC has expressed concerns over the disruption of the COVID-19 vaccination drive in Africa saying it was preventing many Africans who have received the first dose of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine may not be able to receive the second dose 12 weeks after the first dose as recommended in the vaccination guideline. […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) Europe region sidestepped criticism of Denmark’s decision to permanently stop administering the AstraZeneca vaccine, saying the country’s low population numbers and low COVID-19 positivity rate of under 1% allowed for a lot of room to manoeuvre. Denmark’s low rate of infections gives the country manoeuvring room in terms of their […] Continue reading ->
A new partnership between Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations(CEPI), Africa CDC and the African Union Commission to enhance vaccine research, development and manufacturing in Africa has been hailed as “critical” to enable countries to take ownership of their national health security. Following a two day African Vaccine Manufacturing Virtual Conference held earlier this week, the […] Continue reading ->
The United States’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have recommended a “pause” in administration of Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) single-dose COVID-19 vaccine out of an “abundance of caution” following six cases of a rare type of blood clotting among the 6.8 million US recipients of the […] Continue reading ->
Italian prosecutors in the city of Bergamo, the epicentre of the country’s first COVID wave, are reportedly investigating Ranieri Guerra, a senior World Health Organization advisor, for misleading testimony and his role in the suppression of a WHO report into Italy’s coronavirus response “An Unprecedented Challenge“- which contained critical material about the Italian government’s […] Continue reading ->
African vaccine producers supply just 1% of the continent’s needs at present – but the plan is to increase this to 60% by 2040, according to John Nkengasong, Director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control (CDC). “The vision is to ensure Africa has timely access to vaccines to protect public health security, by establishing […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) has called for a global “reality check” as COVID-19 infections increased by 4.4 million in the past week, with countries and individuals abandoning proven methods to protect themselves. “This is not the situation we want to be in 16 months into a pandemic, where we have proven control measures. It […] Continue reading ->
Previous infection with SARS-CoV2 induces effective immunity against future infections by 84% – but reinfection rate is still 16%, found a study published in The Lancet on Friday. This suggests that infection-induced immunity is similar to, or greater than, vaccine-associated immunity, said the authors. The SARS-CoV2 Immunity and Reinfection Evaluation (SIREN) study involved 25,661 health […] Continue reading ->
The European Medicines Agency is reviewing the cases of four people who developed blood clots after receiving Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) COVID-19 vaccine, the regulator announced on Friday. “Four serious cases of unusual blood clots with low blood platelets have been reported post-vaccination with COVID-19 Vaccine Janssen. One case occurred in a clinical trial and […] Continue reading ->