The European Union and the World Health Organization are strengthening their partnership to accelerate technology transfer for the production of messenger RNA vaccines in Africa and facilitate their deployment on the continent.
Visiting Geneva on 24 March, where she met with WHO Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the European Commissioner for International Partnerships, Jutta Urpilainen, announced that at least €24.4 million of the EU budget would be mobilised for these locally produced vaccines.
“Together with Dr Tedros we agreed to strengthen support to our African partners in their efforts to remove the main barriers to access and availability”, she commented.
This EU financial contribution will support: - regulatory strengthening (€11.5 million), which will strengthen the African Medicines Regulatory Harmonisation (AMRH) initiative and the African Medicines Agency; - technology transfer (€12 million); - demand consolidation and strategic purchasing (€1 million).
The EU had previously announced €1 billion of investment in African production.
With this new funding, it will support the mRNA technology transfer centre in South Africa and the training of the workforce.
To date, support from the EU and its Member States for the Technology Centre for mRNA vaccines in low- and middle-income countries totals €40 million provided by the European Commission, France, Germany and Belgium. This amount was announced at the 6th EU-African Union Summit, together with the six production hubs in Africa benefiting from the transfers (see EUROPE 12894/1)
WHO will facilitate technology transfer in sub-Saharan Africa in cooperation with the COVAX Manufacturing Task Force, which was established in May 2021 to identify and address issues preventing universal access to vaccines.
The WHO and G7 goal is to vaccinate 70% of the world’s population by mid-2022. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)