Vaccine allocation still choppy, uneven, and under discussion this week
Shireen Darmalingam
Vaccine update:
- Globally, over 5.95 billion vaccines have been administered across 184 countries at a rate of 33.1 million doses a day.
- The UN General Assembly will discuss access to vaccines this week.
- US President Joe Biden is expected to offer a new vaccine allocation plan to ensure that poorer nations get access to vaccines.
- The US FDA rejected the idea of booster shots on Friday; the CDC is expected to make a decision later this week.
- Infectious disease specialist Anthony Fauci is still backing the US case for boosters.
- The international COVAX facility is reportedly being forced to slash planned deliveries to Africa by around 150 million vaccines this year.
- The scheme expects to have delivered only 470 million vaccines by end December, covering just 17% of Africa’s population (the target is 40%).
- In SA, 15.992 million vaccines have been administered to date with close to 8 million people fully vaccinated; 17,598 vaccines were administered yesterday.
Global cases update:
- Cases have surpassed 229.29 million, while the death toll has surpassed 4.7 million; recoveries are at 205.92 million.
- The US has 429 million cases, accounting for 18% of global cases; the US death toll is 691,880.
- India has 33.47 million cases and 445,165 deaths; Brazil has 21.23 million cases and 590,786 deaths.
- Singapore's new infections have reached the highest since April 2020.
- Japan could lift its state of emergency by end September.
Africa cases update:
- Africa’s Covid-19 cases are at 8.23 million; fatalities are at 206,560.
- Morocco has 919,681 reported cases, Nigeria 201,798, Ghana 125,261, Kenya 246,530.
South Africa cases update:
- SA currently has the 17th highest caseload, at 2.882 million; 2,281 new cases were reported yesterday.
- Active cases are at 64,093; KwaZulu-Natal leads the way, with 28,479 active cases, followed by the Free State with 8,134.
- Covid-19 deaths rose by 58 yesterday, to 86,174; 2.732 million people (or 94.8%) have recovered from the virus.
- 17.35 million tests have been conducted since 5 March 2020; 30,987 tests were conducted yesterday.
- The SA positivity rate is 7.4%.
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