Analysts at the American-British consulting company IHS Markit announced the likelihood of the end of the COVID-19 pandemic only in 2023 due to the lack of equal access to vaccines in different countries of the world. This was announced on Thursday, April 15, by RBC with reference to a study by IHS Markit.
According to analysts, unequal access of countries to vaccines can also lead to national conflicts. Developed countries buy 3-4 times more vaccines than the population needs, while developing countries often do not have access to them.
“Vaccine nationalism can give countries a short-range advantage, but it severely undermines the collective response to the pandemic through its poor impact on vaccine distribution,” it said.
Due to the lack of vaccines in developing countries, new mutations of COVID-19 strains may appear, which will delay the end of the pandemic until 2022-2023.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has created conditions for unprecedented collaboration in the pharmaceutical industry to create vaccines to fight the disease. These efforts have brought success, <...> however, the fight against COVID-19 has led to the emergence of another consequence of the virus – a conflict between countries over the supply of vaccines and their availability, ”the analysts explained.
According to IHS Markit experts, by the end of this year, enough COVID-19 vaccine will be produced to defeat the pandemic, but the uneven distribution between states will not allow this to happen.
“In theory, this (14.7 billion doses – Ed.) Should be enough to completely overcome the pandemic, but the ineffective distribution of vaccines around the world means that the drugs will go mainly to the markets of developed countries,” the study follows.
According to analysts, there are three main factors that can affect the distribution of vaccines: disputes between the European Union and the UK over the procurement of large quantities of vaccines produced in the EU by London; US procurement of vaccine doses exceeding the country’s population by about four times; and India’s decision to temporarily suspend AstraZeneca’s vaccine exports.
The day before, on April 14, the European Commission told Izvestia that the European Union, despite the difficulties with vaccination against coronavirus, intends to vaccinate 70% of the population in the summer of 2021.