COVID-19 in 2022 — a timeline of the coronavirus outbreak

<!-- This site is converting visitors into subscribers and customers with OptinMonster - https://optinmonster.com :: Campaign Title: Content Lock (for Newswire signups) --> <div id="om-ioc9i6ola28hpqohhmux-holder"></div> <script>(function(d,u,ac){var s=d.createElement('script');s.type='text/javascript';s.src='https://a.omappapi.com/app/js/api.min.js';s.async=true;s.dataset.user=u;s.dataset.campaign=ac;d.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(s);})(document,36944,'ioc9i6ola28hpqohhmux');</script> <!-- / https://optinmonster.com --> On Dec. 31, 2019, Chinese authorities alerted the World Health Organization of pneumonia cases in Wuhan City, Hubei province, China, with an unknown cause. What started as a mystery disease was first referred to as 2019-nCoV and then named COVID-19. The timeline below tracks the development of the outbreak in 2022. For earlier developments, visit Devex’s COVID-19 timelines for 2020 and 2021. On Dec. 31, 2022, COVID-19 cases stood at 660.36 million and confirmed deaths at 6.69 million. Visit our COVID-19 page for more coverage, including news, jobs, and funding opportunities. Oct. 20 — The World Health Organization says that COVID-19 vaccination coverage has stagnated in half of the countries across the African continent, with doses administered declining by over 50% between July and September. Oct. 19 — WHO releases the report of the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee on the COVID-19 pandemic. The committee found that the spread of the virus “continues to constitute a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.” Oct. 17 — Moderna and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, sign an agreement for the company to provide up to 100 million variant-adapted COVID-19 vaccines in 2023 to the 92 Gavi COVAX Advance Market Commitment low- and middle-income countries. The two will also cancel existing supply agreements for vaccines that work to prevent severe disease against the original strain of the virus. Oct. 10 — An independent, external evaluation of ACT-A suggests that it's not the best model for future pandemic response. It labeled COVAX as too ambitious — although it was considered the most successful among all of ACT-A’s activities — and said ACT-A had insufficient representation from low- and middle-income countries and regional bodies. It included some blunt statements such as how the health systems and response connector — meant to help strengthen health systems and build countries’ capacity to deploy new tools such as vaccines and treatments for COVID-19 — was “largely dysfunctional.” Oct. 4 — The Medicines Patent Pool signs a licensing agreement for a new COVID-19 oral antiviral pill. The organization, which engages with companies to negotiate cheaper access to treatments, will now be able to grant sublicenses to generic manufacturers interested in manufacturing and supplying the investigational COVID-19 antiviral pill, ensitrelvir. Sept. 29 — The Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator is consolidating its work rather than ending it, Dr. Bruce Aylward, who coordinates the work of ACT-A, tells Devex. Sept. 23 — Pfizer and The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria sign an agreement to procure up to 6 million treatment courses of Paxlovid, the oral COVID-19 antiviral drug. Sept. 22 — The number of weekly deaths are 10% of what they were at the peak of the pandemic in January 2021, says WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a media briefing. Two-thirds of the global population is vaccinated and three-quarters of health workers and elderly individuals, he added. But only 19% of populations in low-income countries are vaccinated and access to treatments in these countries are "virtually nonexistent." “We have spent two and a half years in a long, dark tunnel and we’re just beginning to glimpse the light at the end of that tunnel, but it is still a long way off and the tunnel is still dark with many obstacles that could trip us up if we don’t take care,” he says. The Global Fund signs an agreement with Pfizer to procure up to 6 million treatment courses of Paxlovid, the oral COVID-19 antiviral drug. The treatment will be made available to 132 low- and middle-income countries eligible for Global Fund grants. Sept. 21 — Close to 10,000 people died from COVID-19 during the previous week. Sept. 15 — "We are not there yet. But the end is in sight," says WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a press call, referring to the lifeline of the pandemic. Sept. 14 — The Lancet publishes an analysis on lessons learned from the pandemic. This includes "multiple failures of international cooperation" including lack of timely notification of the initial outbreak, costly delays in acknowledging the virus spreads through the air, and a lack of coordination among countries on how to stop the spread of the virus, among other failures. The number of COVID-19 deaths reported during the previous week was the lowest since March 2020, says WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a media briefing. Sept. 9 — A new fund for pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response was formally launched, with $1.4 billion in pledges from an array of countries and foundations. Sept. 8 — The World Health Organization’s regional office for Africa said the pandemic reduced meningitis control activities by 50% in 2020 compared with 2019. More than 50 million children in Africa missed vaccinations. Sept. 7 — During a press briefing, WHO chief Tedros says that while the number of weekly reported deaths from COVID-19 has dropped by over 80% since February, the death rate is still high. During the previous week, one person died from COVID-19 every 44 seconds, he says. A new public-private group, called the COVID Treatment Quick Start Consortium, launched to provide oral antiviral treatments for COVID-19 in 10 low- and middle-income countries where the drugs remain out of reach for many people. Aug. 26 — Moderna sues Pfizer and BioNTech for patent infringement in the development of a messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccine, alleging that the companies copied the technology from Moderna. "Moderna's IP suit against Pfizer/BioNTech is bad for public health. Both have had huge windfalls. Moderna got billions in US funding. The suit would push mRNA vaccines into a near monopoly & stifle innovation. The public loses. Both companies should waive IP & transfer technology," tweets public health expert Lawrence Gostin, who is director of the O'Neill Institute. Aug. 22 — A coalition of health and development NGOs call to expand an official inquiry into the U.K. government’s domestic response to COVID-19 to also consider what role the country played in increasing global inequality during the pandemic. Aug. 18 — About 22% of the African continent’s population is fully vaccinated for COVID-19, says Africa CDC Acting Director Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, during a press briefing. Vaccinations are progressing at slow rates because not many countries are implementing mass vaccination campaigns, he says, although Africa CDC’s Saving Lives, Saving Livelihoods is working to change this. It has already launched mass vaccination campaigns in Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Namibia, and Nigeria. It plans to soon launch in Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. Aug. 17 — Over the past week, 15,000 people died from COVID-19 globally, says WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a media briefing. “15,000 deaths a week is completely unacceptable, when we have all the tools to prevent infections and save lives,” he says. He added that the number of genomic sequences shared each week has dropped by 90% since the beginning of the year, "making it so much harder to understand how the virus might be changing." He also says the BA.5 sub-variant of omicron represents more than 90% of sequences shared in the previous month. Aug. 4 — Only 20.4% of the African continent has been fully vaccinated for COVID-19, says Africa CDC Acting Director Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma. About 637 million doses have been administered. The top 10 African Union member states that have vaccinated more than 40% of their total population include Seychelles, Mauritius, Rwanda, Morocco, Botswana, Cape Verde, Tunisia, Liberia, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe. July 27 — "COVID-19 deaths have been increasing for the last five weeks and several countries are reporting increasing trends in hospitalisations following waves of transmission driven by omicron subvariants," says WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a news briefing. July 21 — World Health Organization member states agree to pursue a legally binding pandemic instrument that will contain “both legally binding as well as non-legally binding elements.” But there are differences on how they wanted to proceed. An agreed text released by the intergovernmental negotiating body — which was tasked to draft and negotiate a WHO convention, agreement, or other international instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response — concludes that article 19 of the WHO Constitution “is the most comprehensive provision under which the instrument should be adopted, without prejudice to also considering, as work progresses, the suitability of Article 21.” July 12 — WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a news briefing that COVID-19 “surveillance has reduced significantly, including testing and sequencing, making it increasingly difficult to assess the impact of variants on transmission, disease characteristics, and the effectiveness of countermeasures.” He added that diagnostics, treatments, and vaccines are also not being deployed effectively by countries. "We are not prepared for many of the other viral families that represent threats, and we have to have a global [research and development] concerted investment to make sure that our preparedness for future threats is broad,” he says. Partnerships also must be forged now, “You don't want to be exchanging business cards at the site of a disaster,” says Richard Hatchett, CEO at the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, during Devex World. July 8 — Afrigen Biologics Ltd. announces a new partnership with the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for the development of messenger RNA vaccines at the World Health Organization’s technology transfer hub in South Africa. The hub aims to expand know-how around the production of mRNA vaccines in low- and middle-income countries. The partnership will include the sharing of technical skills and materials to hasten vaccine production and help the hub produce “large amounts of DNA, in the mRNA in vitro transcription process, lipid nanoparticle formulation, and upon mutual agreement, research” for new vaccines, a press release says. WHO's emergency committee on COVID-19 meets and concludes that COVID-19 remains a public health emergency of international concern. July 7 — The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has signed a memorandum of understanding with Pfizer for access to Paxlovid, the company’s antiviral therapy to treat COVID-19, says Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, the acting director of Africa CDC. This memorandum will give African nations access to the pill at cost, he says. Reuters reports that six countries — India, South Africa, Pakistan, Indonesia, Egypt, and Tanzania — shared a document with other World Trade Organization members that set a six-month time frame for extending the so-called TRIPS waiver, which suspends some intellectual property rights around COVID-19 vaccines, to treatments and tests. "Extension of the policy tools... to therapeutics and diagnostics will help developing countries to address IP barriers to the expansion and diversification of production," the document says. July 6 — WHO is working to finalize with Pfizer the "appropriate terms and conditions" of access to Paxlovid, the company’s antiviral therapy to treat COVID-19, for low- and middle-income countries, says WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. "This is delaying access, and some countries may choose to wait for a generic version of the antiviral, probably available … [in] early 2023. And this will cost lives. I call on Pfizer to work closely with health agencies and countries to ensure its new oral antiviral is available quickly and effectively," he says. WHO, UNICEF, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria have developed an allocation mechanism in countries for antivirals as they become available. To date, Tedros says, 20 countries have accepted allocations of the drug molnupiravir, while 43 countries have expressed interest in Paxlovid. More than two years since its April 2020 launch, the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator is exploring how it can still meet COVID-19 needs, if not in its current form, says Dr. Bruce Aylward, who coordinates the work of the multilateral partnership. ACT-A’s strategic plan and budget runs only until October. Aylward says that the partnership is “getting very clear signals back from people that we don't want to develop a whole new strategic plan.” “We're going to look at a transition plan … that looks at: How do we make sure that this extraordinary collaboration that we put together can continue to operate but in a mode, in a manner that allows us to make sure the core business of the organizations [in the partnership] also gets attention?” he says. July 5 — The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations will provide up to $30 million to advance the development of a new vaccine that could protect against current and future variants of the COVID-19 virus and other betacoronaviruses, the group says. CEPI is partnering with a consortium led by U.K.-based organization CPI to advance the vaccine’s development. CEPI says it is also providing seed funding of up to $2.5 million to U.S.-based biopharmaceutical company Codiak BioSciences, which is working on a vaccine candidate that aims to offer broad protection against known betaroconaviruses. June 29 — COVID-19 cases are on the rise in 110 countries, driven by two omicron variants, says WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Meanwhile, many remain unvaccinated. Globally, only 75% of health workers and people over age 60 have been vaccinated. Just 58 countries have hit the target of vaccinating 70% of their populations, Tedros says. A universal coronavirus vaccine is still in early stages of research and development, says WHO Chief Scientist Soumya Swaminathan. There’s been some progress in the development of bivalent COVID-19 vaccines, as well as vaccines that target COVID-19 and other viral infections such as influenza. “The scientists feel that this is feasible, that it's doable, [although] obviously it takes a little bit of time to move from the laboratory into the clinic,” she says. Trials for nasal COVID-19 vaccines are ongoing, she adds. June 23 — A study in The Lancet finds that COVID-19 vaccines prevented 19.8 million deaths during the first year of rollout, and more could have been averted if additional people were inoculated, especially in low-income countries. June 17 — The World Trade Organization arrives at a deal on the so-called TRIPS waiver, which has long been a source of controversy. After heavily contested negotiations, member states reach an agreement that temporarily removes intellectual property barriers around patents for COVID-19 vaccines, and they postpone discussions on extending the waiver to treatments and tests by six months. June 9 — The African continent has performed genomic sequencing on over 100,000 positive COVID-19 samples since the beginning of the pandemic, says Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, the acting director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. June 8 — Pregnant women who were hospitalized with COVID-19 in sub-Saharan Africa died at higher rates and had more complications than nonpregnant women with similarly severe COVID-19, as well as pregnant women without the disease, according to a study in six African nations. The study is the largest of its kind looking at this issue in sub-Saharan Africa, though other research on the topic has taken place globally. The European Investment Bank expects to invest €175 million ($186 million) to scale up drug and vaccine development at biopharmaceutical company Biovac’s plant in Cape Town, South Africa, according to a press release. “Africa remains highly vulnerable to vaccine preventable diseases and to both the current COVID pandemic as well as future ones," says Dr. Morena Makhoana, the chief executive officer at Biovac. June 2 — The European Investment Bank announces a loan worth €75 million (over $80 million) for the Institut Pasteur de Dakar in Senegal. With the injection of funding, the institute plans to fast-track operationalization of a new facility for manufacturing vaccines against COVID-19 and other diseases. May 31 — Only 58 countries and territories have vaccinated at least 70% of their populations against COVID-19, which is the global target for the end of June. May 25 — Pfizer has committed to provide patented medicines and vaccines, already available in the United States and Europe, at a not-for-profit price to 45 lower-income countries. The deal includes the provision of Paxlovid, the company’s oral antiviral treatment for COVID-19. May 23 — ​​“We are at the cusp of a vicious cycle that could impact societies for years. The pandemic and war in Ukraine have fragmented the global economy and created far-reaching consequences that risk wiping out the gains of the last 30 years,” writes Saadia Zahidi, managing director at the World Economic Forum, in a press release. May 22 — "The pandemic has led to a massive increase of 28% in depression and 26% in anxiety disorders globally," says WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during the opening address at the World Health Assembly. May 20 — Health ministers from the Group of Seven leading industrial nations adopt a pandemic pact which aims to improve pandemic surveillance and identification systems globally and establish a mechanism for a swift, coordinated response. Almost 18 months after the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine was administered, only 16% of populations in low-income countries have received a single dose, compared to 80% of populations in high-income countries. May 17 — The world largely remains “stuck” with the old systems and tools it had when COVID-19 hit the world in 2019, leaving it unprepared to prevent the next pandemic, experts say in a media briefing. According to Helen Clark, former co-chair of the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response, "If there were a new pandemic threat this year, next year, or the year after, at least, we will be largely in the same place as we were in December 2019. Maybe worse, given the tight fiscal space of many, if not most countries, right now." Philippa Easterbrook, senior scientist on HIV, hepatitis, and sexutally transmitted infections at WHO, says during a press briefing that a link between prior COVID-19 infection and cases of hepatitis in children is still a hypothesis. "We know that CoV-2 in adults can be associated with hepatitis but much less is known about what happens in children," she says. WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says during the briefing that North Korea has had more than 1.4 million suspected cases of COVID-19 since late April, which is the first outbreak reported through the country's state media. "WHO is deeply concerned at the risk of further spread of COVID-19 in the country, particularly because the population is unvaccinated and many have underlying conditions putting them at risk of severe disease and death," he says. May 12 — Global leaders commit about $3.1 billion in new funding to the global COVID-19 pandemic response, among other commitments related to licensing agreements and a generic agreement to lower the price of oral antiviral treatment. These commitments were made at the second global COVID-19 summit — hosted virtually by the United States, Belize, Germany, Indonesia, and Senegal. This includes over $2 billion in funding for the immediate response, and $962 million for the new pandemic preparedness and global health security fund at the World Bank. About $2.5 billion came from over 35 governments, and approximately $700 million from the private sector, foundations, and other nongovernmental entities. May 10 — The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations says it will provide up to $19.3 million for development of a vaccine candidate that provides "broad protection against SARS-Cov-2 variants and other betacoronaviruses" with a consortium that includes Bharat Biotech International Ltd, the University of Sydney, and ExcellGene SA. May 5 — WHO says nearly 15 million died — from COVID-19, causes directly linked to COVID-19, and from the pandemic’s wider impacts on health systems and society — as opposed to the 5.4 million deaths reported between January 2020 and December 2021. Twenty countries account for over 80% of the estimated excess mortality. The system “skews very heavily away from African producers" of vaccines, says Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, deputy director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, during a press briefing. Large procurers of vaccines, mainly Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which leads COVAX, have failed to commit to purchasing doses from African producers. South Africa's Aspen Pharmacare expects it might be forced to shut down production of COVID-19 vaccines due to a lack of orders. Still, only 17% of the population across the African continent is fully vaccinated for COVID-19, he says. Gavi CEO Seth Berkley said, “COVAX has access to enough supply to enable countries to meet their national vaccination targets.” But the challenge is on delivery and demand. The trends show that both vaccine delivery shipments and demand are “slowing down,” specifically during the first and second quarters of 2022, said Eva Kadilli, UNICEF’s supply division director, during an Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator media briefing on Thursday. Another challenge is matching what vaccine countries want and the vaccine supplies coming from COVAX’s advanced purchase agreements and donations from high-income countries. Priority seems to have shifted to messenger RNA vaccines, Berkley said, and newer vaccines such as the one developed by Novavax “haven't had a lot of orders for it,” he added. May 4 — "I am troubled that highly effective antivirals [for COVID-19] are still not accessible to people in low- and middle-income countries. Low availability and high prices have led some countries to rule out buying these lifesaving treatments," says WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during a new briefing. April 28 — Across the African continent, measles cases rose by 400% between January and March, compared with last year. WHO writes in a release that "disruptions by the COVID-19 pandemic including a huge strain on health system capacities impaired routine immunization services in many African countries and forced the suspension of vaccination drives." April 26 — Testing for COVID-19 has fallen by 70% to 90% across the world, making it more difficult for the global health community to monitor the evolution of the pandemic, treat patients, and track variants, says Dr. Bill Rodriguez, chief executive officer of FIND, a co-convener of the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator “diagnostics pillar,” during a press briefing. April 22 — WHO issues its first recommendation for the use of Pfizer’s antiviral drug Paxlovid for patients with mild and moderate COVID-19 that are at highest risk of developing severe disease and hospitalization including those who are unvaccinated, older, or immunosuppressed. The agency calls it the “best therapeutic choice for high-risk patients to date.” Despite its strong backing of the drug, WHO said it worries about accessibility in low-income countries. April 20 — Advocacy groups sign an open letter to Pfizer Chief Executive Officer Albert Bourla criticizing the company’s claim that its intellectual property is a human right in response to a push for a compulsory license to produce the company's Paxlovid COVID-19 oral treatment in the Dominican Republic without the company’s consent. April 15 — South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare may be forced to stop production of Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccines if African nations don't place orders, says Dr. John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, during a press briefing. April 5 — South Africa ends its COVID-19 state of emergency, which was in place for over two years. March 30 — Devex reports WHO is set to release its estimates of excess deaths caused by COVID-19. The excess mortality estimates will account for both direct and indirect impacts of the pandemic, and the figure is more than double the official death toll of 6 million. WHO publishes a 10-year strategy for increasing the capacity of countries globally to conduct genomic surveillance to track outbreaks. "Any new technology comes with the risk of increasing inequity, which is one of the gaps this strategy targets," according to a release from the agency. March 24 — Only 15% of the African continent’s population is fully vaccinated for COVID-19. There are four barriers facing many countries as they work to administer shots into arms: storage; logistics around reaching remote areas; limited workforce surge capacity; and people’s willingness to get the jab, says Dr. John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, during a press briefing. March 22 — Aerium Therapeutics, a new biopharmaceutical company, launches. It is dedicated to the discovery and development of new therapeutics for COVID-19 and its variants, as well as future epidemic and pandemic disease threats. It has established operations in Boston, Massachusetts, as well as Lausanne, Switzerland. Its initial focus is on the development of monoclonal antibodies, or mAbs, for COVID-19 and its variants, and is currently working on two mAbs that have shown “potent neutralization” of all COVID-19 variants of concern, including omicron and its subvariants. March 17 — The Medicines Patent Pool signs sublicensing agreements with 35 companies across 12 nations to produce generic versions of Pfizer’s oral antiviral treatment for COVID-19. March 15 — Politico reports that the EU, South Africa, India, and the U.S. have reached a compromise in negotiations on a waiver on intellectual property rights for coronavirus vaccines. "Under the compromise, which currently only covers vaccines, developing countries that have exported less than 10 percent of the world’s coronavirus vaccine doses in 2021 would be able to authorize the use of a patented coronavirus vaccine without the owner of the patent’s consent," the news outlet says. Melinda St. Louis, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch division, writes in a statement that "a new WTO proposal would fail to advance global access to COVID-related health technologies and may actually mark a setback from existing rules. As reported, this proposal would help no one but the floundering WTO and should be rejected." March 10 — Three times as many people may have died from COVID-19 than has been officially reported, according to an analysis in The Lancet. About 26 African nations now offer COVID-19 booster shots, says Dr. John Nkengasong, director of Africa CDC, during a press briefing. March 9 — It's unlikely that U.S. President Biden will meet his commitment to donate more than a billion coronavirus vaccine doses by the end of September, according to a report from Public Citizen. The donation rate would need to increase by 50%. March 7 — Kenya is announced as the planned site of Moderna’s first messenger RNA vaccine manufacturing facility in Africa. The company had revealed its intentions in October to build such a facility on the continent but hadn’t said which country would host it. Moderna says it will invest up to $500 million in the facility, and it is expected to produce up to 500 million vaccine doses per year for COVID-19 and other conditions. The facility will focus on manufacturing vaccine drug substances, with potential plans to expand its capacity to also include the filling of vaccine vials “as early as 2023, subject to demand.” Globally, reported deaths from COVID-19 surpass 6 million. March 3 — WHO recommends molnupiravir as a COVID-19 treatment for nonsevere patients who are at the highest risk of hospitalization. This includes unvaccinated individuals, older people, and those with immunodeficiencies and chronic diseases. As there is little safety data on the drug, WHO recommends active monitoring for drug safety and says it should not be given to children or pregnant women. The recommendation is based on new data from six randomized controlled trials involving 4,796 patients, according to WHO. The U.S. National Institutes of Health says it will offer several COVID-19 medical technologies to WHO’s COVID-19 Technology Access Pool or C-TAP. The technologies will be sublicensed to the Medicines Patent Pool. However, there are no details yet as to what particular medical technologies will be made available to C-TAP. But the U.N. agency says casirivimab-imdevimab, a monoclonal antibody cocktail, should not be given for COVID-19 infections caused by the omicron variant, after evidence showed that the combination of drugs is ineffective against it. Feb. 24 — One year has passed since COVAX, the international vaccine-sharing initiative, delivered its first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines to the African continent. Feb. 23 — WHO announces a new biomanufacturing training hub in South Korea. The hub will provide “technical and hands-on training on operational and good manufacturing practice requirements and will complement specific trainings developed by the mRNA [messenger RNA] vaccine technology transfer hub in South Africa.” The plan is to start training in July with 370 professionals from Asia, Africa, and South America. WHO also announces five additional countries as “spokes” in a network of nations that will receive support from South Africa’s technology transfer hub to produce mRNA vaccines. The additional five countries are Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, Serbia, and Vietnam. Feb. 18 — WHO announces the first six countries to receive tools needed to produce messenger RNA vaccines in Africa. These are Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Tunisia. A vaccine delivery for refugees at the Thailand-Myanmar border is canceled, as the majority of the intended recipients have already been vaccinated. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance says the COVAX initiative — whose Humanitarian Buffer mechanism was set to deliver the doses — is working to reallocate them. Meanwhile, the Pakistan Red Crescent Society and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies are waiting for doses from the buffer, which they expect to arrive by March. Feb. 15 — While a consensus has not been reached by Western aid donors on how to report COVID-19 vaccine donations as official development assistance, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Development Assistance Committee issues a statement saying that donations of excess doses are eligible to be counted as aid in kind. Its guidance says member countries can use the price of $6.72 per vaccine dose when counting their 2021 aid figures. Members can also report their vaccines at cost if the actual price is lower than $6.72, and doses must have a shelf life minimum 10 weeks upon arrival in a given country. High costs of genomic sequencing are holding back roughly one-third of the countries in the world from genomic sequencing COVID-19, a method which helps identify new variants of the virus, says Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, chief scientist at the World Health Organization, during Devex’s Prescription for Progress event. Europe is, by far, the largest contributor of sequences globally, she says, whereas there are large gaps in capacity across the African continent — with many of the sequences coming from only a few countries — as well as parts of Latin America. Feb. 9 — The Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator asks for $16 billion to deliver life-saving COVID-19 tools to low- and lower-middle-income countries. An article published in The BMJ says The kENUP Foundation "representing the vaccine maker BioNTech has been accused of seeking to undermine the World Health Organization’s initiative to bring covid vaccine manufacturing to the African continent." The foundation sent a document to South African officials saying that WHO’s messenger RNA tech transfer hub’s activities should be “terminated immediately.” Instead, it promoted BioNTech’s proposal to "ship mRNA factories housed in sea containers from Europe to Africa, initially staffed with BioNTech workers, and a proposed new regulatory pathway to approve the vaccines made in these factories. The novel pathway has been described as paternalistic and unworkable by some experts, as it seems to bypass local regulators." Feb. 7 — During the annual African Union Summit, heads of state endorse efforts to transform the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention from a specialized technical institution to a public health agency with more power and autonomy. The Africa CDC, along with WHO, is leading the pandemic response on the African continent. Heads of state also supported the creation of a pandemic preparedness and response authority, an epidemic fund, and a health workforce task team. Feb. 4 — Approval of a messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccine produced at a technology transfer hub in South Africa could take up to three years if companies do not share the technology around the vaccines they’ve produced, says Martin Friede, coordinator at the World Health Organization’s Initiative for Vaccine Research, during a press conference. If an mRNA vaccine producer agrees to cooperate, the process would only take about 12 to 18 months. Feb. 3 — The Africa CDC is promoting three new strategies for the next stage of its fight against COVID-19 — increasing engagement with the youth on vaccine acceptance, promoting self-testing, and integrating the African diaspora into the continent’s response, says Dr. John Nkengasong, director of the institution, during a press conference. Only 11% of the African continent’s population is fully vaccinated. To reach the global goal of vaccinating 70% of populations this year — the speed of vaccinations across the continent needs to increase by sixfold, according to the World Health Organization. Feb. 1 — Thirty countries have still not vaccinated 10% of their population — which was the global goal for the end of September 2021, says Dr. Kate O’Brien, director of WHO's department of immunization, vaccines, and biologicals, during a press briefing. Eighty three countries have not reached the 40% target which was set for the end of 2021. There is a “very worrying increase in deaths” from COVID-19 in most regions of the world, says WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, during the briefing. And the number of cases has risen dramatically. “Since Omicron was first identified just 10 weeks ago, almost 90 million cases have been reported to WHO — more than were reported in the whole of 2020,” he says. Jan. 30 — Two years have passed since WHO declared the COVID-19 outbreak as a public health emergency of international concern. Jan. 20 — The Medicines Patent Pool has signed agreements with 27 generic manufacturers to produce the COVID-19 antiviral treatment molnupiravir. The companies come from 11 countries: Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Jordan, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, South Africa, South Korea, and Vietnam. Jan. 21 — WHO’s strategic advisory group of experts on immunization, or SAGE, says booster doses should be given to high-risk groups such as health workers and older people in countries that have achieved moderate to high levels of primary COVID-19 vaccinations for these high-risk individuals. They should be the priority before primary vaccine shots are given to low-risk groups, according to the experts. But while the recommendations now include booster shots, Kate O’Brien, director of WHO’s department of immunization, vaccines, and biologicals, says: “This does not mean giving boosters, as a priority, to everybody in all ages, and all priority groups. We continue to have the highest focus on the full vaccination of the highest priority groups.” Jan. 20 — About 2.8 million COVID-19 vaccines in the African continent have expired. This is equivalent to 0.5% of all the vaccines the continent has received, says Africa CDC Director Dr. John Nkengasong. Jan. 19 — The U.S. government launches a website where U.S. households can order up to four free at-home rapid test kits for COVID-19. The spread of omicron has prompted countries to review their testing strategies for COVID-19, but while self-testing has been the norm in several high- and middle-income countries, such as the U.K., Malaysia, and India, it’s still not the case in others, such as the Philippines and Somalia. COVAX, the international initiative aimed at ensuring equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, needs at least $5.2 billion in new funding over the next three months, according to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and its partners. Jan. 18 — Merck and UNICEF sign supply deal for COVID-19 antiviral drug molnupiravir. Under the deal, Merck will supply UNICEF up to 3 million courses of the drug for distribution in over 100 low- and middle-income countries, pending regulatory approval. CEPI and Institut Pasteur de Dakar in Senegal sign a memorandum of understanding to ramp up vaccine manufacturing, including COVID-19 vaccines, on the African continent. Jan. 15 — COVAX delivers 1 billionth COVID-19 vaccine dose. Jan. 14 — WHO recommends two additional drugs for COVID-19 treatment. One is baricitinib, an oral drug used for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. WHO recommends the drug be given to patients with severe or critical COVID-19, and for it to be given alongside corticosteroids, an anti-inflammatory drug. The other, under conditional recommendation, is sotrovimab, a monoclonal antibody drug to be given for patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk of hospitalization, such as older people, people with other underlying medical conditions, and those not yet vaccinated for COVID-19. Jan. 13 — The omicron-fueled fourth wave of the pandemic in the African continent is flattening — and if this trend continues, it marks the “shortest-lived surge” in COVID-19 cases on the continent since the onset of the pandemic, according to WHO. The surge lasted for six weeks. But health experts warn that public health measures to prevent the spread of the virus are still as important as ever in managing the pandemic. “Early indications suggest that Africa’s fourth wave has been steep and brief but no less destabilizing,” writes Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa, in a press release. “The next wave might not be so forgiving.” Jan. 12 — Over the previous week, more than 15 million new cases of COVID-19 were reported globally, which is "by far the most cases reported in a single week," says WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, during a press briefing. Jan. 3 — The U.S. FDA has given emergency use authorization for booster doses of the Pfizer and BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine to be administered to adolescents aged 12 to 15 years old. Jan. 2, 2022 — Israel reports a case of an unvaccinated pregnant woman who’s been infected with both flu and COVID-19 viruses. While not new, the case has resulted in a new term, called “Flurona.” For earlier developments, visit Devex’s COVID-19 timelines for 2020 and 2021.