Covid-19 vaccination in Africa has tripled over the past week, but progress is still low and protecting even 10 percent of the continent by the end of September remains “a very daunting task”, the World Health Organization said on Thursday.
Matshidiso Moeti WHO regional director for Africa said 13 million doses were administered in the past week, three times more than the number of shots given in the previous week, but the feat remains a drop in an ocean on the continent home to 1.3 billion people.
According to the Centre for Disease Control, only 2.46 percent of Africans are fully vaccinated, while 23.5 percent of the world population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine with 53.8 percent in the US, and 23.6 percent in Asia.
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South Africa leads the continent with 4.7 percent of its population having received one dose, but in Malawi, it’s just 2 percent, Kenya is at 1.87 percent and Nigeria at 1.09 percent; but, none of these countries scrape above 1 percent of fully vaccinated citizens.
The WHO says the continent needs up to 183 million more doses to fully vaccinate 10 percent of its population by the end of September, and about 729 million more doses to fully vaccinate 30 percent by the end of 2021.
Meanwhile, Africa saw 248,000 new confirmed cases over the past week, with at least 28 countries seeing a surge in infections driven by the delta variant.
The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Africa reached 7,592,195 as of Wednesday, 25th August.
The death toll from the pandemic across the continent stands at 191,048.
Africa’s brutal resurgence driven by the delta variant is further stretching already strained health systems across the continent. As African countries struggle, the United States and other high-income countries are talking about booster shots.
“This is a preventable tragedy if African countries can get fair access to the vaccines,” Matshidiso Moeti told reporters.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus recently said it was “unconscionable” that some countries are now offering booster shots “while so many people remain unprotected.”
“I think it is very difficult for us to talk about booster doses in Africa,” Moeti said Thursday. “We have not covered even 5 percent of the population yet with the initial vaccinations that are needed to slow down the spread of the virus and most importantly, stop what we think might be a fourth wave which is coming.”
Africa will receive 117 million doses in coming months but an additional 34 million will be needed to reach the 10 percent vaccination target, the WHO Africa director added.
Beyond that, though, Moeti urged African countries to ramp up their readiness to utilize vaccines when they arrive. “No precious dose should be wasted,” she said.
However, some experts believe that vaccine supply is not the cause of the low vaccinations in the African continent.
WHO recently said the supply of vaccines to Africa has improved in the last two weeks after a period when countries there struggled to get doses.
Nearly 12 million doses arrived through Covax in July, more than the doses received in April, May and June combined.
“After a tough three months, we’re seeing more positive prospects in terms of vaccine shipments to Africa,” says Phionah Atuhebwe, of the WHO regional office for Africa.
CDC says the continent has now received slightly more than 103 million Covid-19 vaccine doses, with close to 70 percent of these vaccines already administered.
Millions of more doses should be on their way to the continent over the next 12-18 months, so while the discourse when talking about vaccination in Africa has been about supplying enough vaccines, the real issue might be not quantity, but logistics.
Experts believe Africa faces more challenges than most as many regions are highly unstable, with civil wars and domestic terrorism, rampant poverty, and/or corrupt leadership.
In some states, infrastructure and public services have been neglected and plundered for years or even decades, while in others, terrorists have “banned vaccinations” and HCWs have been targeted by rebel gangs.
The Economist estimates that due to the logistics challenge, authorities across Africa have destroyed 450,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses to date.
There are also concerns that Vaccine hesitancy can torpedo vaccination plans. Even with all the infrastructure in place, health and political leaders have been urged to continue to convince people to receive the vaccines.
Experts argue that upping the number of vaccine doses destined for Africa is an important start for the continent’s vaccine program, but only a start.
