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 Rollout of an effective vaccine is seen as a crucial step in helping
battered economies recover from the coronavirus pandemic.
"Just because we talk about speed...it doesn't mean we start
compromising or cutting corners on what would normally be assessed,"
Dr. Soumya Swaminathan said in a social media event.
"The process still has to follow through rules of the game. For
drugs and vaccines which are given to people, you have to test their
safety, first and foremost," she said.
WHO officials did not immediately respond directly to questions from
Reuters over the move by AstraZeneca to pause global trials,
including large late-stage trials, of its experimental coronavirus
vaccine due to an unexplained illness in a study participant.
The vaccine, which AstraZeneca is developing with the University of
Oxford, has previously been described by the WHO as probably the
world's leading candidate and the most advanced in terms of
development.
The WHO is in the midst of rounding up support for a global
coalition, called the ACT Accelerator, in the hope of fairly
distributing vaccines, treatments and diagnostics for the new
coronavirus to rich and poor countries alike. In addition to 92
lower-income countries seeking aid, some 79 wealthier countries have
expressed interest, with a Sept. 18 deadline for binding
commitments.
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But some countries that have struck their own vaccine deals, including the
United States which is not joining the WHO effort.
The vaccine pillar of ACT, called COVAX, hopes to secure enough vaccine to
deliver 2 billion doses by the end of 2021, though concrete fund raising has, so
far, lagged goals. Volume buying and possible tiered pricing offered by some
manufacturers could help make a vaccine more affordable, Swaminathan said.
"You need to come together. Essentially, if every country and every organisation
tries to do this on their own, it's going to be long and hard and difficult,"
she said. "This is the first time that the world will need vaccines in the
billions of doses."
(Reporting by John Miller in Zurich and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by
Toby Chopra)
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