Amid the spread of Corona 19 booster shots, the 'vaccine poor, poor' got worse

While some advanced countries have taken a booster shot (additional vaccination) for the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19), there are still many poor countries where even the first vaccination is difficult, the vaccine poor or poor is clearly showing.

According to the Wall Street Journal on the 27th, about 10 months after the COVID-19 vaccine was distributed to the general public, wealthy countries such as the United States, Israel, and the United Kingdom started boosting vaccinations for those who had received two doses of vaccination, but it is the first in low-income countries around the world. Also, only 2.2% of the population were vaccinated.

Vaccinations in middle-income countries, such as Brazil and India, which were once the hardest hit by the pandemic, are starting to catch up with advanced countries.

However, the situation in poor countries, mainly in Africa, is still not good.

Burundi, in Central Africa, has yet to receive a single dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, while in South Sudan and Afghanistan, only 0.2% and 1.1% of the population have been vaccinated, respectively.

The reasons for the low vaccination rates in these regions are complex.

In countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo and Papua New Guinea, people are hesitant to get vaccinated, or have logistics problems such as limited refrigeration facilities and poor road conditions.

In some cases, such as Afghanistan and South Sudan, where the supply of vaccines is disrupted due to conflicts, or in Burundi, the government ignores the seriousness of COVID-19.

However, the biggest factor is also the shortage of vaccine supply.

Most developing countries depend on COVAX (a vaccine joint purchase and distribution project led by the World Health Organization).

Kovax drastically reduced the expected supply for this year, which it released in January, from 2.27 billion doses to 1.43 billion doses.

This is not enough for even 20% of the population in low- or lower-middle-income countries.

The World Health Organization (WHO) predicted that the monthly vaccine supply to Africa would need to increase more than sevenfold, from 20 million doses to 150 million doses, so that 70% of the population could be vaccinated by September next year.

Vaccine poverty not only threatens the lives of people in poor areas, but also increases the scope for mutations that cannot be prevented by existing vaccines as they fail to prevent the spread of the virus.

Diapuka Saila Ngita, a professor of public health at the University of Kinshasa University's School of Public Health, said the current vaccine-piercing mutation would set back much of its efforts to combat the virus.