Switzerland to donate up to 15 million surplus COVID-19 vaccines
The Swiss government is set to donate up to 15 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to other countries by the middle of this year, via the multilateral mechanism of the COVAX Initiative.
The country has already secured more than enough vaccines for its population of 8.7 million from the 34 million doses of vaccines that it is expected to receive in 2022 – 20 million in the first half of the year and 14 million in the second.
Switzerland had decided to donate 4 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last year, followed by a delay in the delivery of a million doses of the Moderna vaccine so that the COVAX Initiative could benefit directly from freed-up production capacity.
The government also said it would agree to purchase guarantees with manufacturers of drugs to treat SARS-CoV-2 so that people with immune deficiency would have access to them.
Presently, Switzerland is one of the few countries that have done away with almost all coronavirus pandemic restrictions as fears waned that a spike in infections fuelled by the Omicron variant would overwhelm its healthcare system.
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