Richer countries are hoarding covid-19 vacine by buying more than half of global supplies

According to the PVA, 70 lower-income countries will only be able to vaccinate 10% of their entire population. And this, despite the efforts from the Oxford-AstraZenaca vaccination program that pledged to provide 64% of its doses to those in developing countries.

The People's Vaccine Alliance is a network of organizations that includes Amnesty International and Oxfam and Global Justice Now. They are urging drug companies to share their technology and intellectual property to make sure that everyone can have access to the vaccine.

Well beyond what is necessary

Research has shown that richer countries have bought enough doses to vaccinate their entire populations three times over if all the vaccines are approved for use.

Canada, for example, has bought enough vaccines to be able to cover all 38 million of their inhabitants 5 times over.

One more staggering statistic shows that although richer countries represent a mere 14% of the entire world population they have bought 53% of all the most promising vaccines being developed so far.

Discrimination for lack of funds

Anna Marriott, Oxfam's health policy manager, believes that:

No one should be blocked from getting a life-saving vaccine because of the country they live in or the amount of money in their pocket. But unless something changes dramatically, billions of people around the world will not receive a safe and effective vaccine for Covid-19 for years to come.

She also implored all current pharmaceutical companies working on COVID-19 vaccines, like Russia's Sputnik vaccine or the recently approved Pfizer BioNTech vaccine in the UK, to share their advancements so that everyone can get a chance at benefitting from the immunization.