Cuba pledges “lifesaving package” of Covid-19 vaccine support to Global South at Progressive International briefing

Progressive International | Friday, 28 January 2022 | Click here for original article

The Cuban government has announced advanced plans to deliver tens of millions of doses of homegrown Covid-19 vaccines to the Global South, described as “lifesaving” by the head of the Progressive International’s delegation to the Caribbean nation.

Rolando Pérez Rodríguez, Director of Science and Innovation, BioCubaFarma; Olga Lidia Jacobo-Casanueva, Director, Center for State Control of Medicines and Medical Devices (CECMED); Ileana Morales Suárez, Director of Science and Technology Innovation, Ministry of Public Health, Cuba and Coordinator of the national vaccination plan for Covid-19 addressed and took questions from journalists, vaccine manufacturers, public health experts and political representatives from other countries.

Despite the US embargo, Cuba has received funding from The Central American Bank for Economic Integration, which, according to Reuters, is sufficient to produce the 200 million doses. Yesterday (Monday 24 January) at a press briefing in Havana, Dr Vicente Vérez Bencomo, Director General of the Finley Institute of Vaccines said, “they could produce 120 million doses in one year alone.”

At the briefing, the Cuban government announced its plan to get these doses into the arms of those who need them in the Global South, including:

  1. Solidarity prices for Covid-19 vaccines for low-income countries;
  2. Technology transfer where possible for production in low-income countries;
  3. Extending medical brigades to build medical capacity and training for vaccine distribution in partner countries.

The briefing was organised by Progressive International in response to what the World Health Organization (WHO) called a “tsunami” of new Covid-19 cases crashing over the world at the beginning of 2022, a record number since the pandemic began in 2020, amid a situation that WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Gheybreysus described as “vaccine apartheid”. The impact of Covid-19 has been violently unequal: 80 percent of adults in the EU are fully vaccinated, but only 9.5 percent of people in low-income countries have received a single dose of the vaccine.

1. Solidarity prices for Covid-19 vaccines for low-income countries:

2. Technology transfer where possible for production in low-income countries: Cuba is in conversations with more than 15 countries regarding production in their countries.

3. Extending medical brigades to build medical capacity and training for vaccine distribution in partner countries:

The briefing follows the Progressive International’s four-day Summit for Vaccine Internationalism held in June 2021 which hailed a “new international health order” and saw participation from the national governments of Argentina, Mexico, Bolivia, Cuba and Venezuela as well as the regional governments of Kisumu, Kenya and Kerala, India alongside political leaders from 20 countries.

At today’s briefing, responding to expressions on interest in Cuba’s vaccines, Rolando Pérez Rodríguez, Director of Science and Innovation, BioCubaFarma, said:

“Cuba is open to any proposal that implies a greater impact of our vaccines in the world."

David Adler, general coordinator of the Progressive International and head of its delegation to Cuba, said:

“Today’s announcements by Cuban scientists should mark an historic turning point in the history of the Covid-19 pandemic. This lifesaving package sets the standard for vaccine internationalism and a pathway to a New International Health Order, where public health and science are placed above private profit and petty nationalism.”

You can watch the full Briefing here

British Medical Journal reports that Cuban health officials have said that they will apply for World Health Organization approval for one of the country’s homegrown covid-19 vaccines, as they announced that they had secured funding to produce 200 million vaccine doses for low income countries.



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