ROME • Coronavirus vaccine producers have promised billions of doses for poorer countries at a Group of 20 (G-20) health summit, where leaders vowed to expand access to jabs to end the pandemic.
The bosses of Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson announced they would supply around 3.5 billion vaccine doses at cost or discount to low-and middle-income countries this year and the next.
Meanwhile, the European Union pledged to donate 100 million doses and invest in regional manufacturing hubs in Africa to reduce the continent's reliance on imports.
World Health Organisation chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus hailed the "generous announcements", but warned that "in the coming months, we will need hundreds of millions more doses".
In their summit declaration on Friday, the G-20 countries emphasised the importance of open supply chains and equitable access to tools to tackle Covid-19.
"It is a very clear 'no' to health nationalism," said European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen, who co-hosted the summit with Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy, the current G-20 chair.
But the five-page text, containing a list of 16 principles, stopped short of endorsing the contentious idea of a temporary global waiver on patent protections for coronavirus vaccines to boost global production.
Instead, it called for other tools, such as "data sharing, capacity building, licensing agreements, and voluntary technology and know-how transfers on mutually agreed terms".
The summit was billed as an attempt to learn lessons from the pandemic, which has killed more than 3.4 million people globally since the virus was first detected in late 2019.
The final declaration emphasised the need for investment in global healthcare systems, and improved data sharing and surveillance of human and animal diseases.
But while many rich countries are enjoying a slowdown in infections, thanks to vaccination drives, many others are still battling fresh surges. The pressing need to help them dominated the day's discussions.
Across India and its neighbours, Covid-19 cases and deaths have hit record levels in recent weeks, and these Asian nations are counting on vaccine campaigns to head off the next surge.
Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka are close to running out of vaccine doses, and are hoping China and Russia will bolster South Asia's efforts to tackle the devastating pandemic wave.
Bangladesh has about one million doses of AstraZeneca's Covishield and China's Sinopharm jabs, and was expecting 100,000 Pfizer shots, but all will be gone in days, government health chief A.B.M. Khorshed Alam said on Friday.
In Washington, an International Monetary Fund report emphasised the urgent need to vaccinate the world, with a US$50 billion (S$67 billion) plan to end the pandemic focused heavily on expanding the roll-out of vaccines.
It noted that as at last month, fewer than 2 per cent of people in Africa had been vaccinated, while more than 40 per cent of the population in the United States and more than 20 per cent in Europe had received at least one dose.
China, meanwhile, has pledged an additional US$3 billion in aid over the next three years to help developing countries recover, while Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany will boost its contribution to Covax, the international vaccine initiative, to more than €1 billion (S$1.6 billion).
A Covax spokesman told Agence France-Presse that it had secured enough doses through existing and ongoing deals to vaccinate up to 30 per cent of the populations in 92 low-and medium-income countries - about 1.8 billion doses.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, BLOOMBERG
