The West African Health Organisation (WAHO) says it is working with five vaccine manufacturers to produce Coronavirus (COVID-19) jabs for the sub-region.
Its Director-General, Prof. Stanley Okolo disclosed this in Accra at WAHO’s high-level meeting to consider efforts being made to boost vaccine manufacturing in the ECOWAS sub-region.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the meeting was convened in collaboration with the Africa Centre for Disease Control (CDC) and vaccine manufacturers in the sub-region.
The selected manufacturers are DEK Consortium and Atlantic Life Science from Ghana, Innovative Biotech and Biovaccines of Nigeria, and Pasteur Institute in Dakar.
Some of the companies plan to begin building their plants and manufacturing vaccines by August 2022 and September 2022 respectively.
According to Okolo, the objective of the meeting is to build a strong collaboration between the manufacturers and not to create competition among them.
He said some of the manufacturers had signed agreements with global vaccine manufacturers to engage in fill-and-finish and later manufacture their own vaccines.
The director-general said that at present, only one per cent of vaccines used in Africa were produced locally.
According to him, the vision is to achieve a-60 per cent increase by the year 2024 as the continent has all the rudiments and building blocks to make this happen.
Okolo added that the ECOWAS Commission and WAHO under the ECOWAS Authority of Heads of State and Government were facilitating efforts to boost the manufacturing of local vaccines and other medical supplies in the sub-region especially given the vulnerability of the ECOWAS population to the COVID-19 pandemic and other diseases.
Okolo said the manufacturing of vaccines and other medical supplies could not be achieved without improved infrastructure and competent human resources.
He said the COVID-19 pandemic had shown that low- and middle-income countries have had to rely mostly on donations of vaccines from rich nations.
Okolo explained that research had shown that building continental and regional manufacturing capabilities would contribute to pandemic preparedness and strengthen the response to future outbreaks.
According to him, West Africa requires some 370 million doses of COVID-19 to meet the 70 per cent vaccination target.
He appealed to the manufacturers to openly share their knowledge and expertise and effectively collaborate with one another to achieve the expected breakthrough in vaccine manufacturing in Africa.
Okolo said one important aim of WAHO was obtaining the political will and the go-ahead of ECOWAS Council of Heads of States and Governments to bring together manufacturers, partners, external collaborators and regulators to advance the manufacture of COVID-19 vaccines.
“Some of the things we have done on the health side is the harmonisation of the regulations so that you don’t have to go through 15 different countries in order to register a medicine, but you go to a central platform,” he said.
Dr Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Director for Africa, pledged her office’s commitment to support ECOWAS.
“We want to confirm the commitment of WHO regional office for West Africa, in collaboration with WHO headquarters, our great commitment to support member states to strengthen capacity for local production in the region and support member states,” she said.
Dr Elizabeth Gyimah, Team leader, Malarial & Focal Point for Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria & Gambia said the COVID-19 pandemic laid bare the over-reliance of low- and middle-income countries on donations from rich nations.
Also speaking, Prof Kwabena Frimpong Boateng, Chairman of the Presidential Vaccines Committee, said Ghana was working closely with Rwanda and Senegal in the development of the COVID-19 vaccines, which was expected soon in the country for packaging and distribution for commercial use by 2024.
Boateny highlighted some of Ghana’s progress regarding its vaccine development efforts, citing the expected completion of the National Vaccines Institute infrastructure by the third quarter of 2022 to coordinate the development and manufacturing of vaccines.
Amongst others, he said include strengthening collaboration between existing research capacity enhancement of the Food and Drugs Authority to attain International Standard Organisation Level Four of its laboratory performance.
“The enhancement of human resource capacity base for research, management of manufacturing plants, as well as stakeholder engagements for the effective support of government efforts.
“By building continental or regional manufacturing capabilities, WAHO hopes to boost pandemic preparedness and strengthen the response to future outbreaks,” he said.
NAN recalls that as part of the programme for the meeting, WAHO hopes to find out how manufacturers will identify particular vaccines of interest to produce.
Also up for discussion will be the engagement of contract clinical research organisations (CROs) and technology platforms of high yield, high-quality products using the most cost-effective methodologies available, as well as clinical trial centres.
Given the urgency in the region and vulnerability of the ECOWAS population to the COVID-19 pandemics and other diseases, the ECOWAS Commission and the West AFRICA Health Organisation under the decision of the ECOWAS Authorities of Heads of States have pledged their support for the establishment of a robust vaccine production capacity in the ECOWAS region.
Meanwhile, the Institutions that have made commitments and sponsoring the local vaccine manufacturers include Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), West African Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association (WAPMA), United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) World Health Organisation (WHO) Africa Regional Office and Mastercard Foundation.
