The number of doses of the coronavirus vaccine administered worldwide exceeded 200 million on Saturday, an AFP count showed, while the wealthy G7 countries promised more than twice as much aid to support access for the less affluent.
With 45 percent of injections so far among wealthy clubs – which account for just 10 percent of the global population – the G7 said on Friday that its aid to projects like the World Health Organization’s Covax now amounts to $ 7 , 5 billion.
The increase in pledges from the USA, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Japan and Canada came when the permanent member of the UN Security Council, Britain showed a draft resolution to other countries in the global body, asking the rich nations that share doses with the poor torn states.
Seen by AFP, the text “emphasizes the need for solidarity, equity and effectiveness and calls for the donation of vaccine doses from developed economies to low and middle income countries and other countries in need”.
Meanwhile, Russia has moved forward with its local vaccination program, saying 120,000 doses of its third authorized coronavirus vaccine, CoviVac, will reach people in March, following in the footsteps of the Sputnik V and EpiVacCorona injections.
The new vaccine, still in the final stages of clinical testing, was produced by the Moscow-based Chumakov Center and used a different development method than Sputnik and EpiVacCorona, using an inactive virus.
“Today, Russia is the only country in which there are already three vaccines for the prevention of Covid infection,” said Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin.
And New Zealand has started what Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield called “a small but important step on a long journey”, launching jabs for high-risk citizens and those returning from abroad, along with border workers and quarantine.
Neighboring Australia is due to start its own scheme on Monday.
– skipping the line –
In Argentina, Health Minister Gines Gonzalez Garci resigned on Friday after it was reported that he was helping friends avoid the vaccine queue.
President Alberto Fernandez asked him to resign after a 71-year-old journalist, Horacio Verbitsky, announced on the radio that his long-standing friendship with the minister helped him get vaccinated in his office before the general population.
Local media reported that others close to the government were also vaccinated at the health ministry.
In Romania, the government pushed the country’s thousands of homeless people to the top of the vaccine priority list, placing them on the same level as the elderly and chronically ill and reaching 300 in the first days of the trip.
“These people are among the most exposed to the risk of infection. It is difficult for most of them to follow infection control measures,” Health Minister Andrei Baciu told AFP.
Even as countries move forward with vaccination, the death toll is rising, with an AFP count reaching more than 2.45 million worldwide by 1100 GMT on Saturday, with almost 111 million cases.
– ‘How we beat the pandemic’ –
Despite the still alarming numbers, it can be a difficult fight to get some vaccinated, as skepticism remains ingrained.
US President Joe Biden on Friday assured people that the shots were safe when he visited a Pfizer plant in Michigan.
“Please, for you, your family, your community, this country, get the vaccine when it’s your turn and it’s available. That’s how we beat this pandemic, ”he said.
And since vaccines have not yet reached most people almost everywhere, countries continue to use familiar methods to limit infections.
The Senegalese government said on Saturday it would extend the night curfew from 9 pm to 5 am for another month, first introduced in early January in the capital Dakar and in western Thies.
Meanwhile, French Health Minister Olivier Veran said he asked a senior local official to “harden” the curfew in the southeastern city of Nice and in the department of Alpes-Maritimes facing the increase cases – or even return to “partial or total blocking”.
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