(CNN) — The Biden administration will ship millions of covid-19 vaccines to Latin American countries this week as part of President Joe Biden’s commitment to play a leadership role in ending the pandemic around the world.
One million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s covid-19 vaccine will be shipped to Bolivia on Thursday, one million doses of Pfizer will be shipped to Paraguay on Friday, and 1.5 million doses of Moderna would be shipped to Guatemala on Wednesday, according to the White House.
The move is part of the president’s effort to reaffirm America’s leadership on the world stage and make the United States an “arsenal of vaccines” in the fight against COVID-19. Shipping the vaccines to Latin America will also serve to counter efforts by Russia and China to use their own state-funded vaccines to expand their influence in the region and around the world.
White House covid-19 response director Jeff Zients said last week that the Biden administration would share tens of millions of U.S. covid-19 vaccines this summer with countries around the world, as well. of the 80 million it has already allocated.
The White House has said it has been monitoring and is concerned about efforts by Russia and China to use vaccines to make geopolitical breakthroughs. Many countries, including in Latin America, which has traditionally been an area of influence of the United States, have been purchasing large quantities of Russian and Chinese vaccines to fill the gaps in their own vaccine deployments.
The White House has said that at least 75% of the 80 million vaccines would be shared with the global vaccination program called Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access, or Covax, and 25% would be shared directly with countries in need.
The White House says scientific teams and legal and regulatory authorities from all the countries involved have been working together to ensure prompt delivery of the vaccines.
In addition to those 80 million vaccines, Biden has pledged to donate 500 million doses of the Pfizer covid-19 vaccine globally. The president has emphasized that there are no conditions for accepting vaccines purchased in the United States.
“Our vaccine donations do not include pressure for potential favors or concessions. We are doing this to save lives, to end this pandemic. That’s it. Period,” Biden said earlier this year when he announced donations from Pfizer.
The president has also said that $ 2 billion in U.S. contributions would go toward a global coronavirus vaccine initiative and provide support for Covax. It also pledged an additional $ 2 billion in funding depending on contributions from other nations and meeting dose management targets.
Biden said Tuesday that the US was projected to reach the mark of having 160 million fully vaccinated Americans by the end of the week and that his administration would engage in a targeted outreach to vaccinate more people.
The announcement came after the nation fell short of its initial July 4 goals of having 160 million people fully vaccinated and 70% of American adults with at least one COVID-19 vaccine. As of Wednesday afternoon, 157.6 million Americans are fully vaccinated and 67.1% of American adults have received at least one vaccine, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC).
Zients acknowledged that it would take a few more weeks to reach those goals and said the administration had more work to do to vaccinate younger Americans, particularly those between the ages of 18 and 26.
“It is up to people to decide whether or not they want to get vaccinated,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Wednesday. “But what we have seen as a barrier, for months, has been access and information. So we are going to continue to deploy the tactics that we have seen in recent months.”
–
