Recently, the WHO demanded a temporary ban on COVID-19 vaccine booster shots for rich countries, mentioning a great difference between those and poorer nations as its reason. As per the WHO’s data, high-income nations administer about 50 dosages per 100 members of their populations, whereas low-income nations do it at 1.5 dosages per 100 individuals. Therefore, the ban would last up to the completion of September 2021 at the least.
As per the WHO’s Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, those individuals require vaccines urgently, particularly older folks, health workers, and other at-risk population members. Ghebreyesus understands the concern in every government to safeguard its individuals from coronavirus’s Delta strain. However, Ghebreyesus finds it unacceptable that certain nations have used almost all of the international vaccine supply when the most at-risk people worldwide are unvaccinated. For the uninitiated, the term ‘at-risk’ here refers to those who are prone to develop coronavirus disease.
There might be a situation where a larger part of coronavirus vaccines goes to poorer nations, not to the relatively wealthier ones. Ghebreyesus recommends having the ban in place until the situation arrives with a possibility for every nation to vaccinate 10% or more of its population against the disease.
In July 2021, pharmaceutical company Pfizer requested the Food and Drug Administration’s authorization to use the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine’s third shot for Americans. In response to its request, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as, the FDA said that fully vaccinated Americans do not require a booster vaccine shot now. As per the two organizations, the US is lucky to have a wide availability of very effective vaccines for people aged 12 years and above.
The organizations also stated that fully vaccinated individuals are protected against not just severe disease but also death. The above statement also applies to the two possible situations emerging due to the coronavirus strains that presently circulate in the nation, like Delta. They said that the public would be ready for booster dosages in the event of the science world showing that these doses are required.
