Africa Business Radio

The World Health Organization and its partners have said they hope to provide Africa with about 30 per cent of the COVID-19 vaccines the continent needs by February, badly missing the 60 per cent vaccination coverage goal that African leaders had once hoped for this year.WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called the massive disparity in vaccination rates between rich and poor countries a solvable problem and urged pharmaceutical companies to prioritise the UN-backed COVAX initiative, which is designed to share vaccines globally and provide shots at no cost to lower-income countries.The African Union accused manufacturers of COVID-19 shots of denying African countries a fair chance to buy them and urged manufacturing countries – in particular India – to lift export restrictions on vaccines and their components.