A New Commitment for Vaccine Equity and Defeating the Pandemic

IMF Blog, June 1, 2021

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Canonical URL: A New Commitment for Vaccine Equity and Defeating the Pandemic

Broad-based global economic recovery requires an end to the COVID-19 health crisis; access to vaccination is key.
A dangerous gap persists between richer and poorer nations; low-income nations have received less than 1 percent of vaccines administered so far.
A two-track pandemic is developing, increasing the risk of deadly variants that can ricochet across the world and force reimposition of public health measures.
An IMF staff proposal estimates that investing $50 billion to scale up vaccinations and related measures will:
- Bring the pandemic to an end faster in the developing world, reduce infections and loss of lives, and accelerate the economic recovery.
- Generate some $9 trillion in additional global output by 2025.
- Allocate around 60 percent of the gains to emerging markets and developing economies and the remaining 40 percent to the developed world.

WHO and COVAX goal: vaccinating approximately 30% of the population in all countries by the end of 2021.
Potential achievable targets: reach even 40% in 2021 through other agreements and surge investment, and at least 60 percent by the first half of 2022.
WHO, UNICEF, the World Bank and Gavi have conducted vaccine readiness assessments in over 140 developing countries.
The World Bank will have vaccine projects up and running in at least 50 countries by mid-year.

Vaccinate more people faster:
- Urgent additional financing for low- and middle-income countries, with a very significant proportion in the form of grants and concessional financing.
- Immediate donation of doses to developing countries synchronized with national vaccine deployment plans, including through COVAX.
- Cooperation on trade to ensure free cross-border flows and increasing supplies of raw materials and finished vaccines.
Insure against downside risks (variants and booster needs):
- Invest in additional vaccine production capacity by at least one billion doses.
- Diversify production to regions with little current capacity.
- Share technology and know-how and scale up genomic and supply-chain surveillance.
- Develop contingency plans to handle virus mutations or supply shocks.
- Call on WTO members to accelerate negotiations towards a pragmatic solution around intellectual property.
Strengthen testing, treatment, and public health measures:
- Immediately boost testing and tracing, oxygen supplies, therapeutics and public health measures while ramping up vaccine deployment and the ACT-Accelerator initiative.

Total estimated cost: $50 billion.
Strong case for grants of at least $35 billion.
G20 positive signals: recognizing the importance of providing about $22 billion in additional funding for 2021 to the ACT-Accelerator.
Additional financing needed: about $13 billion to boost vaccine supply in 2022 and further scale up testing, therapeutics and surveillance.
Remainder of the overall financing plan—around $15 billion—could come from national governments supported by multilateral development banks, including the World Bank’s $12 billion financial facility for vaccination.
The IMF is preparing an unprecedented Special Drawing Rights (SDR) allocation to boost the reserves and liquidity of its members.

Two non-negotiable requirements: speed and coordination.
- Calls for upfront financing, upfront vaccine donations, and upfront precautionary investments and planning.
- Full transparency in procurement and delivery processes.
- All parties—public, private, international financial institutions, foundations—must move in tandem.
All blockages to expanding supply must be removed to allow the plan to succeed; the WTO is working on freeing up supply chains.
Support for local manufacturing capacity in low- and middle-income countries is crucial for current and future pandemic preparedness.

Investing $50 billion to end the pandemic is described as potentially the best use of public money in our lifetimes, yielding large development dividends and boosting global growth and well-being.
The window of opportunity is closing fast; delays increase human suffering and economic losses.
The authors announce a new commitment across their institutions to scale up financing, boost manufacturing and ensure the smooth flow of vaccines and raw materials across borders to dramatically increase vaccine access and support the health response and economic recovery.

Op-Ed by Kristalina Georgieva, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, David Malpass and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala