*The World Health Organisation discloses the six countries were selected as the first recipients of technology from the organisation’s global mRNA vaccine hub, in a push to ensure the African continent can make its own jabs to fight COVID and other diseases

Isola Moses | ConsumerConnect

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has announced that Nigeria and five other African countries have been chosen to begin production of COVID-19 Vaccines, with the continent having had limited access to jabs against the damaging virus.

ConsumerConnect gathered Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO, when making the the announcement Friday, February 18, 2022, said: “Today, I’m delighted to announce the first six African countries that will receive technology from the hub to produce their own mRNA vaccines: Egypt, Kenya Nigeria, Senegal South Africa and Tunisia.”

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO

WHO also noted that the six African countries were selected as the first recipients of technology from the organisation’s global mRNA vaccine hub, in a push to ensure the African continent can make its own jabs to fight COVID and other diseases, agency report said.

Dr. Ghebreyesus stated: “I was honoured to visit the Hub last week. And it’s already producing results, with Afrigen’s announcement that it has produced its own mRNA vaccine, based on publicly-available information about the composition of an existing vaccine.

“We expect clinical trials to start in the 4th quarter of this year, with approval expected in 2024. We expect the benefits of this initiative will extend far beyond #COVID19, by creating a platform for vaccines against other diseases including malaria and tuberculosis.”

The Director-General of the global health body further said: “WHO will work with the companies and the government in each country to develop a roadmap for training and production, based on their needs and capacities.

“Thank you all, and we look forward to working with all of you to make this project a success, for the healthier, safer and fairer Africa.”

No other event like the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that reliance on a few companies to supply global public goods is limiting, and dangerous, stated he.

Ghebreyesus, therefore, stressed that the best way to address health emergencies and reach universal health coverage is to significantly increase the capacity of all regions to manufacture the health products they need.

Hitherto, the WHO Director-General was reported to have continually called for equitable access to vaccines in order to beat the pandemic, and rails against the way wealthy nations have hogged doses, leaving Africa lagging behind other continents in the global vaccination effort.

A ceremony marking the mRNA tech transfer announcement was held Friday in Brussels at the summit between the European Union and the African Union, report said.

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said: “We have been talking a lot about producing mRNA vaccines in Africa. But this goes even beyond. This is mRNA technology designed in Africa, led by Africa and owned by Africa.”

Currently, only one percent of the vaccines used in Africa are produced on the continent of some 1.3 billion people.

The WHO set up a global mRNA technology transfer hub in South Africa last year to support manufacturers in low- and middle-income countries to produce their own vaccines.

It iwas learnt the global hub’s role is to ensure that manufacturers in those nations have the know-how to make mRNA vaccines at scale and according to international standards.