Canada donates 17.7 million Covid-19 vaccines to poor countries

Vaccines donated by Canada will be managed by Covax as a shared vaccine sharing program

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, OTTAWA – Canada will donate 17.7 million doses of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine to third world countries. This is one form of Canada’s contribution to managing the global pandemic.

The vaccine donated by Canada will be managed by Covax as a joint vaccine sharing program managed by the World Health Organization (WHO), the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation (CEPI) and Gavi. “This donation is the result of our proactive approach to securing hundreds of millions of Covid-19 vaccines in our initial contract. With nearly 55 million vaccines in Canada, and with provincial and territorial demands for these vaccines met, we are now in a position to donate these excess doses, ”Canadian Procurement Minister Anita Anand said on Monday. the page Anadolu Agency.

Anand said his country would also donate up to C $ 10 million to UNICEF. If the donations and the federal government hit the $ 20 million target, it would provide the funds needed to immunize four million people.

Previously, the Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, again highlighted the problem of global gaps in vaccine supply. Ghebreyesus believes that the current distribution of vaccines is still not fair and equitable. “Some countries and territories are actually ordering millions of booster doses, before other countries have the necessary supplies to immunize their health workers and the most vulnerable,” he said on Monday.

Vaccines aren’t the only way out of the pandemic, Ghebreyesus says. But his presence is very necessary. Especially now that the highly contagious variant of the Covid-19 delta has spread to 104 countries. “The Delta variant is spreading around the world at a rapid rate, causing a new spike in Covid-19 cases and deaths,” he said.

So far, the world has recorded that the world has recorded 187.23 million cases of Covid-19. The pandemic has killed more than 4 million people worldwide. A total of 3.46 billion doses of vaccine have been administered worldwide.