World Bank, "COVAX" Agree to Accelerate Vaccination in Developing States

The World Bank and the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) Program, which specializes in providing vaccines worldwide, have announced a funding mechanism to expedite the provision of vaccines to developing countries across the world.

These group of nations are suffering from lower vaccination rates against the Coronavirus (known also as COVID-19) compared with the developed countries.

According to "Reuters", a news agency,  this mechanism allows the program to purchase in advance, at more competitive prices, from vaccine production companies on the basis of a pooled demand from the developing countries through financing from the World Bank (WB) and other multilateral development banks.

World Bank President David Malpass said that obtaining a vaccine remains the biggest challenge for developing countries to protect their peoples from the health, social and economic repercussions of the pandemic.

He explained in a statement that this mechanism will provide new supplies of the anti-corona vaccines and allow more countries to expedite the purchase of vaccines. He considered that this mechanism would also provide transparency regarding the availability of vaccines, prices, and delivery dates.

The World Bank and COVAX agreement, backed by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), is expected to help low- and middle-income countries get more doses in addition to the doses they receive with full support.

The new mechanism comes in light of mounting concern about the slow pace of vaccinations in low-income countries as the " Delta" strain of the deadly virus sweeps through the planet now.

On the other hand, Director –General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has warned of the possibility of the emergence of a new strain of the Coronavirus (known also as COVIDID-19), stressing that the possible new strain may be more dangerous than the " Delta" strain which sweeps through the globe now and causes about 90% of infections across the world.

Dr. Ghebreyesus indicated during a speech in the 138th edition of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that the emergence of a news strain of COVID-19 may lead to spreading out infection in all parts of the world.

He added that as the Coronavirus invades the planet, new very dangerous variants of the deadly may be more serious than the "Delta" which causes many harms to populations of dozens of countries in the present time, warning that many strains of the COVID-19 may lead to appear of a new variant that could trespass all anti-Corona vaccines and then return the world to the starting point.