“Building a sailboat in a storm”: The Evolution of COVAX in 2021 and Its Impact on Supplies to Southeast Asia’s Six Lower-Income Economies
Zaini, Khairulanwar | February 2022
Abstract
As it became increasingly evident that vaccines would be central to the recovery from the global pandemic, the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) Facility was created to ensure equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, especially for poorer countries. However, the erratic and delayed COVAX shipments in the first half of 2021 led to doubts about the Facility’s ability to fulfil its pledge of securing and delivering 2 billion doses by the end of the year. In June, the Malaysian vaccine minister Khairy Jamaluddin derided it as an “abysmal failure”. Remarkably, by September 2021, the Facility was confident enough to forecast the allocation of 1.4 billion doses by the end of the year—with 1.2 billion of those to be disbursed gratis to lower-income countries. COVAX’s improved fortunes in the latter part of 2021 can primarily be attributed to a surge in dose donations from wealthier countries, as they began releasing their excess inventory of vaccines.
This article will examine how the COVAX Facility evolved in 2021 over two distinct phases and the implications for six lower-income Southeast Asian countries.4 In the first phase, which coincided with the first half of 2021 (1H), the COVAX Facility had to rely on its own ability to purchase vaccines from the manufacturers. In the second phase, from July onwards (2H), the Facility was instead sustained by dose donations from the West
Citation
Zaini, Khairulanwar. 2022. “Building a sailboat in a storm”: The Evolution of COVAX in 2021 and Its Impact on Supplies to Southeast Asia’s Six Lower-Income Economies. © ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute. http://hdl.handle.net/11540/14848.PDF ISBN
978-981-5011-42-5
Print ISBN
978-981-5011-41-8
ISSN
0219-3213
Keywords
Program Evaluation
The Development Agenda
Staff Development
Skills Development
Aged Health
Quality of Health Care
Public Health
Partnerships in Health Reform
Health Systems
Development projects
Physical infrastructure
Soft infrastructure
Infrastructure finance
Infrastructure bonds
Pandemic
Vaccination
Testing
World Health Organization
Quality of Health Care
Partnerships in Health Reform
Health
Health Standards
Health Care Cost Control
Health Care Access
Health Risk
Health Issues
Environmental Health Hazards
Education, Health and Social Protection
Urbanization
Urban Services
Urban Planning
Urban Conditions
Sanitary facilities
Health facilities
Hygiene
Waste disposal
Health hazards
Public health
Vaccine distribution
Medical Economics
Disease Control
Occupational Hygiene
Medical Services
Health Costs
Sanitation
Diseases
Water Quality
Respiratory Diseases
Health Indicators
Disadvantaged Groups
Social condition
Health Care Services
Health Standards
Health Service Management
Health Costs
Medical Statistics
Lockdown
Urban Population
Traditional Medicine
Medical Statistics
Drug Policy
Preventive Medicine
Medical Economics
Disease Control
Sanitation
Health Hazards
Urban Plans
Urbanism
Diseases
Economic Development
PPE
Economic development
Standard of living
Trade development
Employment
Testing kits
Tracking
Hospices
Delivery of health care
Prevention of disease
Health status indicators
Sanitation services
Cost of medical care
Health status indicators
Sanitation services
Sickness
Illness
Prevention of disease
Health status indicators
Cost and standard of living
disabilities
Nutrition and state
Food policy
Nutrition policy
Covid
Health status indicators
Medical and health care industry
Vaccination
Delivery of medical care
Social distancing
Labor income
Labor policy
Manpower policy
Promotions
Career development
Job analysis
Self-evaluation
Supervisors
Vocational guidance
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