(Trends Wide) — The White House announced Wednesday that the United States will significantly increase the number of covid-19 vaccines it will send to foreign countries beginning in 2022, in an effort to end the pandemic around the world.
As part of a virtual summit on covid, to be held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, President Joe Biden will announce that the United States will purchase an additional 500 million covid-19 vaccines from Pfizer to donate to the low- and lower-middle-income countries around the world, a senior administration official said before the summit. The newly announced 500 million doses are in addition to the 500 million that the United States has already pledged to share with other nations.
These vaccines will begin shipping in January, and between January and September next year, the US will ship 800 million vaccines worldwide, the official said. With these vaccines, the United States total exceeds 1,100 million vaccines donated to other countries.
“The president’s strategy from day one has been to take care of Americans and help vaccinate the world, and so even as we mount an unprecedented national vaccination program here, we buy 500 million doses of vaccines for the sole purpose of give them to others, “the official said, adding that the US will now double that commitment even as the country continues to vaccinate Americans and prepares for possible reinforcements.
The official said the additional 500 million vaccines will be purchased at a non-profit price and distributed through the Covax mechanism.
“We are showing that you can take care of your own, while helping others. We can and must do both,” said the official.
Summit for covid-19
The summit will be made up of heads of state, leaders of international organizations, the private sector, philanthropists, non-governmental organizations and other partners from around the world, according to the administration official, who said there are more than 100 countries and 100 participating organizations. .
The summit will consist of four separate sessions and is expected to last more than four hours, with both President Biden and Vice President Harris presiding over one session.
“The president will call on world leaders to raise the level of global ambition to end the covid pandemic by 2022 and to rebuild better health security to prevent and prepare for future pandemics,” the official said.
Biden will call on world leaders across all sectors to focus on three specific areas to help end the pandemic, including: vaccinating the world fairly and efficiently, saving lives now by working to solve the global oxygen and make testing and therapeutics more available and prepare for the next pandemic.
The White House sent a list of “deliberately ambitious” goals and targets to summit participants, encouraging them to take bold steps to end the pandemic. Those goals and targets will be announced after Thursday’s summit.
“We need to align around common goals and objectives to hold ourselves and the world accountable for collective action to end the pandemic and obviously to prepare for the next one,” the official said.
Trends Wide has previously reported on some of the targets expected to be set at Thursday’s summit, including urging world leaders to collectively commit to vaccinating 70% of the world’s population against COVID-19 in within a year and ask nations to guarantee the availability of US $ 3 billion this year and US $ 7 billion in 2022, to “finance the preparation and administration of vaccines, combat doubts and acquire auxiliary supplies.”
