Emergency response vaccines—a challenge for the public sector and the vaccine industry (original) (raw)

Effective vaccine safety systems in all countries: A challenge for more equitable access to immunization

Vaccine, 2013

Serious vaccine-associated adverse events are rare. To further minimize their occurrence and to provide adequate care to those affected, careful monitoring of immunization programs and case management is required. Unfounded vaccine safety concerns have the potential of seriously derailing effective immunization activities. To address these issues, vaccine pharmacovigilance systems have been developed in many industrialized countries. As new vaccine products become available to prevent new diseases in various parts of the world, the demand for effective pharmacovigilance systems in low-and middle-income countries (LMIC) is increasing.

Vaccines As A Global Imperative--A Business Perspective

Health Affairs, 2011

During the past thirty years, vaccines have experienced a renaissance. Advances in science, business, and distribution have transformed the field to the point where vaccines are recognized as a "best buy" in global health, a driver of pharmaceutical industry growth, and a key instrument of international development. With many new vaccines available and others on the horizon, the global community will need to explore new ways of ensuring access to vaccines in developing nations. So-called tiered pricing, which makes vaccines available at different prices for countries at different levels of economic development; innovative financing mechanisms such as advance market commitments or offers of long-term and high-volume contracts to vaccine producers; and technology transfers such as sharing intellectual property and production techniques among companies and countries can all play a part in bringing new life-saving vaccines for pneumonia, rotavirus, malaria, and other diseases to developing countries.

Preparing for Pandemic Vaccination: An International Policy Agenda for Vaccine Development

Journal of Public Health Policy, 2005

The international use of influenza vaccine is growing, especially in developing countries. Since 1997, avian H5N1 influenza in Southeast Asia has caused several human infections and high mortality. Experts warn that the next influenza pandemic is imminent and could be severe. Prevention and control will depend on the rapid production and worldwide distribution of specific pandemic vaccines. If the vaccine supply is to be sufficient to meet global demand, issues related to the intellectual property rights for the reverse genetics technology essential for vaccine production must be resolved. In addition, candidate ''pandemic-like'' vaccines must be developed and tested in clinical trials to determine the most antigen sparing formulation and the best vaccination schedule. These studies must involve all vaccine companies and will require international coordination and public funding. Whether this international policy agenda for pandemic vaccine development will succeed is uncertain, but it will provide a good indication of whether ''good governance'' for global public health can be achieved.

Vaccination Worldwide: Strategies, Distribution and Challenges

2021

The Coronavirus 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus represents an unprecedented crisis for our planet. It is a bane of the über connected world that we live in that this virus has affected almost all countries and caused mortality and economic upheaval at a scale whose effects are going to be felt for generations to come. While we can all be buoyed at the pace at which vaccines have been developed and brought to market, there are still challenges ahead for all countries to get their populations vaccinated equitably and effectively. This paper provides an overview of ongoing immunization efforts in various countries. In this early draft, we have identified a few key factors that we use to review different countries’ current COVID-19 immunization strategies and their strengths and draw conclusions so that policymakers worldwide can learn from them. Our paper focuses on processes related to vaccine approval, allocation and prioritization, distribution strategies, po...

Sustainable introduction of affordable new vaccines: the targeting strategy

Vaccine, 1998

Immunization prevents over 3 million child deaths from vaccine preventable diseases such as diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, measles and polio every year. New vaccines against respiratory and diarrhoeal diseases have the potential to prevent an additional 8 million deaths. Assuring that the existing and new vaccines are available to all children in the world is a global health priority. The health bene®ts of new vaccines like hepatitis B and Haemophilus in¯uenzae type B (Hib) are indisputable. In the case of hepatitis B, over 1.2 millions deaths could be prevented each year if children and at risk adults were immunized with the hepatitis B vaccine. However, despite the clear health need and bene®t, many countries have been unable to provide thè new' vaccines, like hepatitis B vaccine, to their populations. For these countries, the limitation is not the delivery structure. Most countries now have immunization delivery structures which can provide immediate access to 80% of the country's newborns. Nor is it the vaccine availability as adequate capacity exists to meet the demand. The limitation has been the inability of governments to ®nance the vaccine because of a combination of factors including dependence on donors, donor policy, inadequate recognition by governments of the value of vaccines and, for some countries, the absolute price of the vaccines. The successes and failures in introducing a`new' vaccine like hepatitis B vaccine into the world have clearly illustrated that it is economics and not epidemiology which dictates introduction of the vaccine into national immunization programmes. UNICEF and the WHO Global Programme for Vaccines and Immunization (GPV), have now developed and adopted a framework which dierentiates countries based on their capacity to be ®nancially self-sucient for their vaccine needs. This framework forms the basis of strategies designed to co-ordinate the actions of governments, donors, agencies and vaccine manufacturers in order to ensure all countries have rapid access to aordable vaccines. #

Commentary: From Scarcity to Abundance: Pandemic Vaccines and Other Agents for “Have Not” Countries

Journal of Public Health Policy, 2007

The recent impasse between the Indonesian Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization (WHO) over sharing H5N1 viruses in return for access to affordable pandemic vaccines highlights slow progress in defining an antigen sparing vaccine formulation, developing licensing requirements that meet the needs of populations and obtaining government funding for vaccine trials. Currently, vaccine-producing countries would have difficulty producing enough doses for their own people and few doses would be left over for non-producing (''have not'') countries. Yet within a few months of the onset of a new pandemic, several billion doses of live-attenuated and recombinant hemagglutinin H5 vaccines could be produced for ''have not'' countries, provided a new and disruptive system of ''top down'' management could be organized. In its absence, a ''bottom-up'' alternative that uses widely available and inexpensive generic agents like statins must be considered. The ''have not'' countries must continue to put pressure on WHO and leading countries to ensure that they will have access to the interventions they will need.