What is Africa’s plan in terms of a vaccine roll out?
On the 14th of February, 2020, Egypt announced the first COVID case in Africa. Less than two weeks
later, Nigeria announced the first case in Sub-Saharan Africa. Since then, we have had over 4 million
confirmed cases in Africa and over 100,000 deaths. The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating effect
on Africa, on mortality and on the economy. Fortunately, vaccines have been made to combat the
coronavirus disease. The following vaccines have been granted Emergency Use by the World Health
Organisation. They are;
- AstraZeneca/Oxford
- Johnson and Johnson
- Moderna
- Pfizer/BionTech
- Sinopharm
The two most popular vaccines are the Moderna and the Pfizer/BionTech vaccine. On the 13th of January,
2021, the African Union announced that they secured almost 300 million vaccines for Africa in a deal. This
deal is independent of COVAX (Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access), one of the three initiatives of the
World Health Organisation to ensure equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines worldwide. While this is an
admirable feat, 300 million vaccines for a continent with 1.216 billion people barely covers 40% of the
population. This doesn’t account for vaccines that will have to be tossed out or vaccines that may not be
properly stored once they reach their destination. Africa is still the least vaccinated continent, with only a
few people in the continent fully vaccinated. In this article, we’ll be discussing Africa’s plan in terms of a
vaccine roll-out, success rates, the hindrances, and how Africa can be fully vaccinated.
What is Africa’s plan in terms of a vaccine roll-out?
There is not much information available about the vaccine roll-out in Africa but we do know a few things.
With donations promised by China, India, Russia, the UAE, and the COVAX initiative, Africa is set to
receive 600 million COVID vaccines by the end of 2021. Judging by the data we have, here are the vaccine
availability ratios of African counties from the top 10 countries with the highest vaccination availability
and the 10 countries with the lowest vaccination availability.
HIGHEST VACCINE AVAILABILITY
- Seychelles – Seychelles has around 134 doses for every 100 people. This is mostly because it has a
population of around 100,000 people. They have fully vaccinated about 62 thousand people,
which is around 63% of the population. - Morocco – Morocco is the most vaccinated African country with a large population. Morocco has
around 34 doses for every 100 people. Morocco has fully vaccinated around 13.6 % of the
population. This is around 5 million people who have been fully vaccinated. - Mauritius – Mauritius has around 17 doses for every 100 people. Mauritius has only been able to
fully vaccinate around 8,500 people. This is 0.7% of the country’s population. - Equatorial Guinea – Equatorial Guinea has around 13.75 doses for every 100 people. They have
fully vaccinated over 56,000 people and have a fully vaccinated 4.2% of the total population - Comoros – Comoros has 6.72 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated around
58,000 people, which is 1.8% of the population. - Tunisia – Tunisia has around 6.48 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated around
267 thousand people, which is 2.3% of the population. - Zimbabwe – Zimbabwe has around 6.13 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated
about 218 thousand people, which is 1.9% of the population. - Sao Tome and Principe – Sao Tome has around 5.65 doses for every 100 people. There is no data
available for fully vaccinated people, but around 12 thousand people have received a dose, which is
5% of the population. - Cape Verde – Cape Verde has around 4.32 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated
around 2 thousand people, which is 0.5% of the population. - Togo – Togo has around 3.3 doses for every 100 people. There is no information on fully
vaccinated people, but around 276 thousand people have received one dose. This is around 2.5% of
the population.
LOWEST VACCINE AVAILABILITY - Central African Republic – Home to almost 5 million people, the Central African Republic has the
lowest availability rates with only 0.01 doses for every 100 people. They have only given out 667
doses which is around 0.20 % of the total population. - Democratic Republic of Congo – Congo is home to over 86 million people. They only have 0.02
doses for every 100 people. They have given out around 5000 doses which is 0.06% of the total
population. - Madagascar – Madagascar has around 0.05 doses for every 100 people. There is no information on
the fully vaccinated population; however, they have given out 17,258 doses to their population of
over 26 million. - South Sudan – South Sudan has around 0.07 doses for every 100 people. They have given out
almost 8 thousand doses; however, they have a population of over 11 million. - Benin – Benin has around 0.11 doses for every 100 people. They have 418 fully vaccinated people,
which is less than 0.1% of the population. - Algeria – Algeria has around 0.17 doses for every 100 people. They have given out 75 thousand
doses. They have a population of over 43 million people. - Cameroon – Cameroon has around 0.19 doses for every 100 people. They have 5,083 fully
vaccinated people, which is less than 0.1% of the population. - Guinea-Bissau – Guinea-Bissau has around 0.30 doses for every 100 people. They have given out
5,889 doses. They have a population of about 2 million. - Mali – Mali has around 0.43 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated over 15
thousand people, which is less than 0.1% of the population. - Niger – Niger has around 0.55 doses for every 100 people. They have fully vaccinated 7,102 people,
which is less than 0.1% of the population.
It is important to note that most of the countries with lower availability rates are war-torn countries with
either no government in power or a weak government in power.
These are the current availability rates for vaccines in some African countries. Besides Seychelles, most
African countries do not have the number of vaccines needed to vaccinate the population. South Africa, the
African country with the highest COVID-19 cases, only has 1.09 doses for every 100 people. Nigeria,
another country with one of the higher COVID-19 cases in Africa, has 0.94 doses for every 100 people.
South Africa has only fully vaccinated 481 thousand people, which is 0.8% of the population, while Nigeria
has given 1.93 million doses out so far to a population of 200 million. To reach WHO’s goal of a 60%
vaccinated African continent by 2022, there needs to be a change in how the vaccine roll-outs are executed.
African countries like Malawi and Congo have had to dispose of vaccines or even return them because they
were not able to use them before the expiry date. To ensure African countries will meet WHO’s goal, there
needs to be proper education on vaccines to the population as well as more administering locations. This
will make vaccines more trustworthy and easily accessible. These are the two main issues hindering the
administration of vaccines in Africa.