The rapid development of safe and effective Covid-19 vaccines has led to the vaccination of more than half the world’s population over the past two years — an unprecedented public health achievement. But the uneven distribution of vaccines has created a stark gap in protection between different countries: While more than 70 percent of the citizens of Brazil, Canada and China are fully vaccinated, for example, fewer than 1 in 10 people have received a single dose in many African countries. In addition to creating a humanitarian crisis, this unequal distribution of vaccines favors the rise of new viral variants, threatening public health everywhere. Why has COVAX, the international initiative created to make sure all countries have access to vaccines, failed to reach that goal? What can be done to get doses to vulnerable populations?

Watch this conversation with Maria Elena Bottazzi, co-director of Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development at Baylor College of Medicine, and Jerome Kim, director general of the International Vaccine Institute, to learn how we can achieve more equitable vaccine distribution — and why that’s necessary to end the pandemic.

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