On Monday, health experts and leaders called for more efforts to boost local production of medical products, especially vaccines, to address public health priorities in Africa.
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According to official data, they made the call while speaking at a high-level workshop that gathered African health ministers, and representatives from the World Health Organization (WHO) and Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, to discuss strategies to enhance local production of medical products to address public health priorities in Africa.
The one-day conference coincided with the inauguration of a BioNTech manufacturing facility in Rwanda.
Speaking at the workshop, Rwandan Minister of Health Sabin Nsanzimana opened the forum with a call to promote vaccine equity in Africa.
"Local production and distribution are much more reliable solutions for the African continent, which currently outsources more than 90 percent of its vaccine, medicine, and therapeutic needs," said Nsanzimana. "We are transitioning from commitment to action, moving into a new era of solutions."
For his part, Jean Kaseya, the director general of Africa CDC, said that the Africa CDC has established the Partnership for Africa Vaccine Manufacturing (PAVM) and developed a 20-year strategy with a focus on ensuring that at least 60 percent of the vaccines needed in Africa are produced in Africa.
WHO Regional Director for Africa Matshidiso Moeti stressed that the production of high-quality, safe vaccines on the continent will transform the way Africa approaches disease prevention and control, stressing that strengthening national regulatory systems is key to the success of this program.
Early this year, the Africa CDC reiterated its ambition of manufacturing 60 percent of the vaccine doses required on the continent by 2040.
The African continent only produces about 0.1 percent of the global supply of vaccines currently, according to the Africa CDC.
Recent estimates by the Africa CDC show that between 6,000 and 7,000 skilled jobs will need to be created in Africa by 2030 for the range of needs of the vaccine manufacturing industry alone.
In 2021, BioNTech signed deals with Rwanda and the Institute Pasteur de Dakar, a biomedical research center in Senegal, to set up manufacturing sites on the continent.