The UN World Health Organization or WHO has unveiled an $8-billion pathway out of the coronavirus pandemic, called the Global Covid-19 Vaccination Strategy.
It aims to make Covid-19 vaccines accessible to everyone, everywhere, according to official sources.
If implemented correctly, the strategy is expected to inoculate 40 percent of people in all countries by the end of the year, and 70 percent by the middle of 2022.
WHO had previously pressed governments to vaccinate 10 percent of the world’s people by the end of last month. However, more than 55 countries, mainly in Africa and the Middle East, missed the target.
In remarks to the virtual launch, UN Secretary-General António Guterres urged nations to unite and make it a success.
“Without a coordinated, equitable approach, a reduction of cases in any one country will not be sustained over time. For everyone’s sake, we must urgently bring all countries to a high level of vaccination coverage,” he said, speaking from New York.
As of Thursday, there more than 235.6 million confirmed Covid-19 cases worldwide, and close to five million deaths, according to latest WHO data.
The new strategy requires 11 billion vaccines to be made available, to defeat what the UN agency has labelled “a two-track pandemic.”
Even though nearly 6.5 billion doses have been administered globally as of the end of September, and almost one-third of the world’s population is fully inoculated, vaccine inequity persists.
“High and upper-middle income countries have used 75 percent of all vaccines produced so far,” said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, speaking from its headquarters in Geneva.
Meanwhile, less than half of one percent of doses have gone to low-income countries. “In Africa, less than five percent of people are fully vaccinated,” he added.