U.N. chief wants $8 bln to vaccinate 40% of world in 2021

PanARMENIAN.Net - U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed on Thursday, October 7 for $8 billion to help equitably vaccinate 40% of people in all countries by the end of the year, as the World Health Organization (WHO) launched a plan that aims to inoculate 70% of the world by mid-2022, Reuters reports.

Guterres urged the Group of 20 rich countries to deliver on their "desire to get the world vaccinated" at a summit in Rome later this month.

"Not to have equitable distribution of vaccines is not only a question of being immoral, it is also a question of being stupid," he said at a joint news conference with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

So far, more than 6.3 billion doses of coronavirus vaccines have been administered globally. But more than half of the world has yet to receive at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to Our World in Data, and less than 5% of Africans have been fully vaccinated, according to the continent's top public health official.

"The whole U.N. system has shown leadership, but we have no power," Guterres said. "The power is in the countries that produce vaccines or might produce them, and in the companies."