The coronavirus vaccine produced by Oxford University and AstraZeneca will be available on a non-profit basis “in perpetuity” to low- and middle-income countries in the developing world.
The details of arrangements to supply poorer countries came as AstraZeneca revealed the interim results of a phase 3 trial of the vaccine, which is being heralded as the first to meet the more challenging requirements of the developing world.
However, vaccine hopes for poorer nations were tempered by the head of the World Health Organization, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who said there was a risk the world’s poor could be trampled in a “stampede for vaccines”, adding that $4.3bn (£3.2bn) was still needed in order to share vaccines fairly.
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Unlike the vaccine produced by Pfizer-BioNTech, which requires ultra-cold storage, the AstraZeneca vaccine can be kept in the kind of conventional fridge used to store vaccines around the world, with a shelf life of up to six months.
Also unlike the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, AstraZeneca’s experimental vaccine is already a part of Covax, the global initiative that is hoping to distribute about 2bn doses to 92 low- and middle-income countries at a maximum cost of $3 a dose.
As global justice campaigners demanded more transparency from Oxford and AstraZeneca over details of the deal to supply doses to people in the developing world, the partnership confirmed in a statement that lower-income countries would receive the vaccine on a not-for-profit basis.
“A key element of Oxford’s partnership with AstraZeneca is the joint commitment to provide the vaccine on a not-for-profit basis for the duration of the pandemic across the world, and in perpetuity to low- and middle-income countries,” it said.
Source: Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine to be sold to developing countries at cost price
