'Vaccine nationalism' prolongs corona virus pandemic, warns WHO Chief

Berlin: As the number of cases are gushing across the world, the Chief of World Health Organization (WHO) warned against 'vaccine nationalism' and called for global solidarity in the rollout of any future corona virus vaccine.

On Sunday,  addressing the 3-day World Health summit in Berlin, the director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, "To step out of the greatest crisis, the best way to do is to vaccinate some people in every country rather than all people in some countries".

Vaccine nationalism will prolong the pandemic and not shorten it. The only way is to fight against Covid together and by making sure that poorer countries have access to corona virus vaccine, he added.

Scientists around the world are racing to develop a vaccine against Covid-19 which has killed 1.1 million people. Several vaccines are tested in clinical trials. And the most advanced "phase 3" stage involving tens of thousands of volunteers.

The European Union, the United States, Britain and Japan have already placed large orders with the companies involved in developing the most promising vaccines,developing and poor nations are out of this list.

The WHO has reported a third straight day of record new infections across the world, calling on countries to take further action to curb the spread of the disease.

The agency's figures showed that 465,319 cases were declared for Saturday alone, half of them in Europe.

The WHO has launched an international scheme known as Covax aiming to ensure equitable access of the Covid vaccine to all, but its in a struggle to raise the required funds.