US nudges Moderna to establish vaccine facility in Africa
US nudges Moderna to establish vaccine facility in Africa
By Williams Ekanem, New York
The Unites States is beckoning on Moderna, a biotechnology company in COVID- 19 vaccines production to prioritize building a manufacturing facility in Africa to facilitate vaccines production and distribution on the continent.
Dr David Kessler, Chief Science Officer of the White House COVID-19 Response Team gave the hint in a television interview in the United States recently.
Speaking on MSNBC with Rachel Maddow, Kessler said that the White House is encouraging Moderna to establish a vaccines plant somewhere in Africa.
Although Kessler, a former Food Drugs Administration (FDA) commissioner did not go into details of the plan, but he stated that the project would expedite vaccines administration in the African continent.
Moderna has in recent times come under fire from global health leaders and advocates for not making its vaccine and know-how more widely available to address the vaccination gap among rich and poor countries. Advocates have pushed the US government to exercise its licensing rights over the vaccine to force Moderna to share technology.
Investigations show that the United States has more than just licensing rights on Moderna, as the government also has substantial interest, having invested $6 billion through the National Institute of Health (NIH) in the Moderna vaccines overtime, according to Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC filings by the vaccine production company.
Findings show that Moderna is currently ongoing discussion to establish a manufacturing plant in Africa, although choice of country site is still under wraps.
Commenting on this development, Collen Hussey, Moderna director of corporate communications said that “the company is working on plans to allow it to fill doses of its COVID-19 vaccine in Africa as early as 2023, in parallel to building an mRNA vaccine manufacturing facility in Africa.”
Hussey added that the plan is a forward-looking statement that is subject to what she refers to as “unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, many of which are beyond Moderna’s control.”
In a related development, Moderna in late October 2021 announced a new Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to make up to 110 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine available to the Africa Union.
Investigations reveal that the company is to deliver the first 15 million does in the fourth quarter of 2012, 35 million doses in the first quarter of 2022, and up to 60 million does in second quarter of the same year.
All the doses are said to be offered at Moderna’s lowest tiered price, in line with the company’s global access commitments.
The company CEO, Stephane Bancel said, “ we believe our vaccine can play an important role in addressing the needs of low-income countries given its combination of high phase three efficacy against COVID-19, strong durability in the real world evidence, and superior storage and handling conditions.
