By World leaders pledge to donate over a billion Covid-19 vaccines to poorer countries
The PM Boris Johnson has confirmed that world leaders who have gathered at the G7 summit in Cornwall over the weekend have pledged to donate over a billion Covid-19 vaccines to poorer countries.
Of the one billion vaccine donations, the UK plan to donate 100 million.
Boris Johnson said at a press conference on Sunday afternoon: “I’m very pleased to announce that this weekend, leaders have pledged over one billion doses either directly or through funding to Covax.
“That includes 100 million from the UK to the world’s poorest countries which is another big step towards vaccinating the world.
“And that’s in addition to everything scientists and governments and the pharmaceutical industry have done so far to roll out one of the largest vaccination programmes in history.
“This is another billion made up of a massive contribution by the United States and other friends.
“Already of the 1.5 billion vaccines that have been distributed around the world, I think that people in this country should be very proud that half a billion of them are as a result of the actions taken by the UK Government in doing that deal with the Oxford scientists and AstraZeneca to distribute it at cost.”
The target to vaccinate the entire world population by the end of 2022 will be done “largely thanks to the efforts of the countries who have come here today,” said the PM.
He also told reporters at the press conference that world leaders at the summit had took part in discussions that went “far beyond” defeating the pandemic.
He said: “We were clear we all need to build back better in a way that delivers for all our people and the people of the world.
“That means preventing a pandemic like this from ever happening again, apart from anything else by establishing a global pandemic radar which will stop new diseases before they get the chance to spread.”
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