The United States will ship 9 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to African countries and 2 million doses worldwide later on Friday amid concerns about the novel coronavirus Omicron variant that was first detected in South Africa, White House Assistant Press Secretary Kevin Munoz said
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 03rd December, 2021) The United States will ship 9 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to African countries and 2 million doses worldwide later on Friday amid concerns about the novel coronavirus Omicron variant that was first detected in South Africa, White House Assistant Press Secretary Kevin Munoz said.
"Today, we are shipping 9 million vaccine doses to Africa and another 2 million worldwide. We need every country to step up with the same urgency and ambition as the United States," Munoz said via Twitter.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden pledged to accelerate the United States' efforts to vaccinate people throughout the world.
In September, Biden announced that the United States was donating another 500 million vaccine doses to help other countries to protect from the novel coronavirus.
According to the World Health Organization, vaccination rates in Africa remain very low with only 7.5% of the population fully vaccinated.
South African health officials have said Omicron was detected in fully vaccinated individuals, the cases were mild and characterized the reaction in the United States and other primarily Western countries to the variant as a "storm in a tea cup."
