South African President Cyril Ramaphosa spoke of a “phenomenal step”. It is about making Africa more independent of vaccines that are supplied from abroad.
In South Africa, specialists are also to be trained who are necessary for the manufacture of the vaccines. “This initiative is the first of many that we will support,” said French President Emmanuel Macron, who recently visited South Africa. “This is a great message especially for Africa, which has the least access to vaccines,” said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
In the best case scenario, it can be expected that the first corona vaccines could be produced in South Africa in nine to twelve months, said WHO expert Soumya Swaminathan. The modalities still have to be clarified. South Africa and India are among the countries that are particularly urging that patent protection for such vaccines be dropped.
Tedros again pointed out the dramatic increase in the number of new corona infections in parts of Africa. In some countries, the numbers tripled or even quadrupled within a week – according to WHO estimates, a consequence of the extremely low vaccination rate on the continent.