Rich nations stockpiling a billion more Covid-19 shots than needed: Report

Rich countries are on course to have over a billion more doses of Covid-19 vaccines than they need, leaving poorer nations scrambling for leftover supplies as the world seeks to curb the coronavirus pandemic, a report by anti-poverty campaigners found on Friday.

In an analysis of current supply deals for Covid-19 vaccines, the ONE Campaign said wealthy countries, such as the United States and Britain, should share the excess doses to "supercharge" a fully global response to the pandemic.

The advocacy group, which campaigns against poverty and preventable diseases, said a failure to do so would deny billions of people essential protection from the Covid-19-causing virus and likely prolong the pandemic.

The report looked specifically at contracts with the five leading Covid-19 vaccine makers - Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Oxford-AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Novavax.

It found that to date, the United States, the European Union, Britain, Australia, Canada and Japan have already secured more than 3 billion doses - over a billion more than the 2.06 billion needed to give their entire populations two doses.

(Hindustan Times)