How to End the COVID-19 Pandemic by March 2022

Abstract

The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.

COVAX versus Sinovac: A test for the legitimacy of the World Health Organization in South East Asia

“…Two main factors lay behind the pre-purchase gap and the limited effectiveness of COVAX: (a) a shortfall of funds available to the COVAX Facility and (b) a manufacturing and supply chain bottleneck (Agarwal and Reed, 2021;Bown and Bollyky, 2020;Excler et al, 2021;Huh and Dubey, 2021). With regard to the first, in its early phase COVAX aimed at distributing vaccine doses across eligible countries until each country had enough to cover 20% of its population (or until donor resources were exhausted).…”

“…The COVAX initiative has in several cases failed to deliver to many target countries worldwide the doses of vaccines envisaged in the initial allocation plan. It has often experienced delay in its roll-out time (Agarwal and Reed, 2021; Bown and Bollyky, 2020; Excler et al, 2021; Huh and Dubey, 2021). In December 2021, the WB estimated that there is still a significant gap between the number of doses pre-purchased by COVAX and the amount needed to achieve 60% vaccination coverage in each country by March 2022.…”

“…In December 2021, the WB estimated that there is still a significant gap between the number of doses pre-purchased by COVAX and the amount needed to achieve 60% vaccination coverage in each country by March 2022. The WB defines this gap as the pre-purchase gap (Agarwal and Reed, 2021). As a result, many low- or lower-middle-income countries (LMICs) had to rely on other suppliers in an attempt to increase the availability and access to vaccines of their populations (Agarwal and Reed, 2021).…”

Financing vaccine equity: funding for day-zero of the next pandemic

“…Despite the economic case for access to vaccines, as of March 2021, more than a year into the pandemic, the international community had not yet committed to purchase enough vaccines for the world's population, even though developers then reported available capacity to produce at least 10 vaccine candidates with Phase 3 trial results suggesting efficacy above the WHO minimum threshold (Agarwal and Reed 2021). High-income countries made advance commitments to purchase more vaccine than needed for their populations, including to hedge against the risk that some candidates would fail to secure approval.…”

“…By December 2020 it had raised just $2 billion. Only in June 2021 had it raised about $10 billion dollars, sufficient to cover about 30 percent the population in low-and lower-middle income countries (Agarwal and Reed 2021).…”