{"id":162010,"date":"2022-01-07T21:15:14","date_gmt":"2022-01-07T21:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.one.org\/africa\/covids-aftershocks-a-vaccine-for-everyone-finally\/"},"modified":"2024-01-25T12:39:05","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T12:39:05","slug":"covid-vaccine-for-everyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.one.org\/africa\/stories\/covid-vaccine-for-everyone\/","title":{"rendered":"COVID’s Aftershocks: A vaccine for everyone\u2026 finally"},"content":{"rendered":"

Top news<\/h2>\n

Model behavior:\u00a0<\/strong>A new COVID vaccine is on the block<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 and the US scientists behind it decided to make it available to the world (read: no patents, no-frills tech transfer, and a round of applause from us to the makers, Texas Children\u2019s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine). Production is underway in India under the drug name CORBEVAX, and its\u00a0inventors speculate<\/a>\u00a0that it will soon reach more people in middle- and low-income countries than those donated by G7 nations. It\u2019s already been licensed for production in Botswana and other African countries. This new \u201cWorld\u2019s Vaccine\u201d is made through microbial fermentation, which is already used widely in African labs, making it much easier to produce than vaccines using mRNA technology. Adding to its accolades: It\u2019s also easy to store and inexpensive to make.<\/p>\n

Not feelin\u2019 (20)22:\u00a0<\/strong>This new vaccine is extremely welcome news, because the world is currently very far off from its New Year\u2019s resolution to vaccinate 70% of every country by this September. This goal is only feasible in about a dozen African countries,\u00a0according to ONE\u2019s new analysis. Countries such as Botswana and Rwanda should easily hit this mark, but for others such as Chad, it could be as late as 2114 at the current, sluggish pace. That\u2019s partly because G7 countries still haven\u2019t delivered on their dose sharing commitments. COVAX delivered a little over 300 million doses in 2021 \u2014\u00a0less than half<\/a>\u00a0of what it had promised. Check out\u00a0ONE\u2019s Pandemic Report Cards\u00a0to see how individual G7 countries are performing.<\/p>\n

Is boosted the new vaxxed?:<\/strong>\u00a0As Omicron\u00a0floods hospitals<\/a>, some increasingly consider boosters\u00a0to be the new standard<\/a>\u00a0for full vaccination. US health officials announced this week that a booster is necessary to remain\u00a0\u201cup to date\u201d<\/a>\u00a0on COVID vaccinations (although their definition of fully vaccinated remains unchanged). But as richer countries roll out third (and\u00a0fourth<\/a>) doses, global distribution of boosters remains vastly unequal: over\u00a0535 million people\u00a0have received boosters in high-income countries, while just 57 million people in low-income countries have received their\u00a0first dose<\/em>. If (or perhaps when) boosters become the medical standard, progress towards the 70% vaccination target will be massively upended.<\/p>\n

Goodbye wave:<\/strong>\u00a0South Africa appears to be past its peak of deaths and hospitalizations from the Omicron-driven COVID wave. Scientists estimate that excess deaths (a proxy for COVID\u2019s true toll)\u00a0peaked in the country at around 3,000 a week in this wave<\/a>, dramatically lower than the Delta and Beta peaks (around 10,000 and 16,000, respectively). The Omicron wave also appears to have started \u2013 and slowed \u2013 more suddenly than previous waves. While this gives hope that\u00a0the latest surges of COVID cases and restrictions in African countries<\/a>\u00a0could be short-lived, South Africa entered the Omicron wave\u00a0with a vaccination rate three times higher<\/a>\u00a0than the continent\u2019s average, which improved the country\u2019s outcomes.<\/p>\n

New year, same problems:\u00a0<\/strong>92 countries\u00a0failed to meet the WHO goal to reach 40% vaccination in all countries in 2021. Meanwhile, cases in Africa have hit pandemic highs. This week,\u00a0Mozambique\u2019s President Filipe Nyusi and his wife<\/a>\u00a0became the third head of state in southern Africa to test positive for COVID in recent weeks, after South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Namibian President Hage Geingob.<\/p>\n

The real flightmare:\u00a0<\/strong>One lesson that we all (hopefully) learnt late in 2021 is that our pandemic fates are interconnected. Omicron\u2019s rapid global spread triggered thousands of\u00a0flight cancellations<\/a>\u00a0globally, dubbed a\u00a0\u201cflightmare\u201d<\/a>\u00a0by some. But attention seems to have waned on the continued biased restrictions on African countries, with Kenyans still\u00a0banned from 40 countries<\/a>.<\/p>\n

My flurona:<\/strong>\u00a0The\u00a0combination of the flu and COVID<\/a>\u00a0in a patient in Israel has been labelled \u201cflurona,\u201d in a new double dose of virus. The patient, the first recorded person to have both viruses at the same time, was a young, unvaccinated pregnant woman who presented with mild symptoms. Given the\u00a0pandemic\u2019s impact on vaccination campaigns<\/a>\u00a0in Africa and lower-income countries in general, the possibility of combined infections presents added complexity and risk to those without equitable access to COVID vaccines or therapeutics.<\/p>\n

Getting chippy:\u00a0<\/strong>Kenyan KFC chains have\u00a0run out of imported potatoes<\/a>\u00a0to make chips \u2013 making the restaurant the latest victim of pandemic-induced global supply chain issues. People\u00a0took to Twitter<\/a>\u00a0to express their distaste over the issue, which has also impacted South Africa, the US, and Japan. But this story has a crispy, golden upside: it\u2019s forcing KFC to work with Kenyan potato farmers to\u00a0increase their capacity and quality control<\/a>\u00a0in order to meet supply chain requirements for the US-owned company, which could benefit the sector in the long run.<\/p>\n

Organising for organised crime:<\/strong>\u00a0Senior South African politicians, including former President Jacob Zuma, led a years-long effort to\u00a0weaken the South African Revenue Service (SARS)<\/a>, which oversees taxation and enforces legislation, according to a blistering new report by the Judicial Commission. These findings come among a\u00a0broader investigation<\/a>\u00a0into issues of corruption and mismanagement of resources through South Africa\u2019s public sector. Paired with the recent wave of COVID-19 cases, South Africa is having a tumultuous transition into the new year.<\/p>\n

The numbers<\/h2>\n