It’s a fact we’ve heard and written too many times: Africa is overly reliant on vaccines from abroad, importing 99% of its supply. That didn’t seem to be a global health priority — until COVID-19 came along and many African countries were left waiting for doses to arrive.
There are now efforts to change that, with the African Union setting an ambitious goal: African manufacturers should develop, produce, and supply more than 60% of the continent’s vaccine needs by 2040 — up from less than 1% currently.
But just how feasible is that? African manufacturers and potential investors are looking at one pharmaceutical company as a test case, namely South African company Aspen Pharmacare, dubbed by one expert as “a titan of the African pharmaceutical production landscape.”
About the authors
Jenny Lei Ravelo@JennyLeiRavelo
Jenny Lei Ravelo is a Devex Senior Reporter based in Manila. She covers global health, with a particular focus on the World Health Organization, and other development and humanitarian aid trends in Asia Pacific. Prior to Devex, she wrote for ABS-CBN, one of the largest broadcasting networks in the Philippines, and was a copy editor for various international scientific journals. She received her journalism degree from the University of Santo Tomas.
Amruta Byatnalamrutabyatnal
Amruta Byatnal is a Senior Editor at Devex where she edits coverage on global development, humanitarian crises and international aid. She writes Devex CheckUp, a weekly newsletter on the latest developments in global health. Previously, she worked for News Deeply in the United States, and The Hindu in India. She is a graduate of Cornell University where she studied international development. She is currently based in New Delhi.
