South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday noted the need to accelerate the process of finding tools to fight the coronavirus pandemic, adding that future vaccines should be regarded as a public good to benefit all
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 10th September, 2020) South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday noted the need to accelerate the process of finding tools to fight the coronavirus pandemic, adding that future vaccines should be regarded as a public good to benefit all.
"We now have to speed up the process of finding tools to combat the pandemic ... it is essential that humanity should have a sense that if and when a vaccine is developed, all countries, including my own continent, Africa, should benefit and not be left behind," Ramaphosa said at the first Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator Facilitation Council meeting.
According to the president, a COVID-19 vaccine should be regarded as a public good to benefit all because as long as someone in the world has the coronavirus, however remote they may be, the whole world is at risk of the COVID-19 resurgence of COVID-19.
"We cannot achieve universal health coverage when the COVID-19 vaccine is available only to countries that are well-resourced in terms of research, manufacturing distribution and service," Ramaphosa added.
The president also called on countries to act in solidarity and support current global initiatives to fund COVID-19 vaccines, praising the World Health Organization's ACT initiative to enable collaboration among scientists to find safe and effective vaccines.
