Six countries in Africa to begin manufacturing mRNA vaccines

Feb. 18 (UPI) -- Six countries in Africa will receive technology that will allow them to manufacture mRNA vaccines for the continent after applying and being selected under a World Health Organization program.

The WHO said in a statement Friday that Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia will receive support in boosting manufacturing at a commercial scale from the global mRNA technology transfer hub.

The hub, established in 2021 to address the hoarding and supply issues during the COVID-19 pandemic, is part of a larger effort from the WHO to empower low- and middle-income countries globally to produce their own vaccines and treatments during health emergencies beyond the coronavirus.

"This is an initiative that will allow us to make our own vaccines and that, to us, is very important," South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said.

"It means mutual respect, mutual recognition of what we can all bring to the party, investment in our economies, infrastructure investment and, in many ways, giving back to the continent."

With mRNA technologies, countries could create their own insulin, cancer medicines, vaccines to protect against diseases like malaria, tuberculosis and HIV.

The WHO has also been working to establish a training hub to help countries develop their biomanufacturing research and production capacity, with the first training beginning with the selected countries in March.

On Thursday, WHO director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus met with Werner Hoyer, president of the European Investment Bank, to discuss a $565.8 million pledge to invest in health systems in Africa "to close the health funding gap."

Data from the WHO shows that there have been 8,264,647 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Africa since the start of the pandemic with just 59 new cases reported on the continent on Friday. There have been 167,702 deaths reported in Africa, the fewest of the WHO's six regions tracked.

More than 202.2 million of the continent's 1.3 billion people have received at least one dose of a vaccine, with 127.4 million considered fully vaccinated.

The most prevalent vaccine in Africa has been the Sinopharm vaccine produced by Beijing Bio-Institute of Biological Products -- a subsidiary of China National Biotec Group. The AstraZeneca vaccine and the Covishield vaccine manufactured by Serum Institute of India have also dominated the African market.

The majority of vaccines in the country have been provided by bilateral and multilateral agreements, though some have come from donations.