UK to ship 20 million vaccine doses to developing countries by 2022

The UK will ship 20 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to developing countries by 2022, the Prime Minister is set to announce today.

He is expected to tell the G20 in Rome that: “Like a waking giant, the world economy is stirring back to life.

“But the pace of recovery will depend on how quickly we can overcome Covid. Our first priority as the G20 must be to press ahead with the rapid, equitable and global distribution of vaccines.”

The i reports that the donations will consist of the UK’s entire order of one-shot Janssen Covid-19 jabs, and that 20 million Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines will also be shipped.

The UK has already committed to donating 100 million doses by June 2022.

Eighty per cent will be distributed via the WHO’s Covax scheme.

Yesterday former Prime Minister Gordon Brown told ITV that many countries had “overordered and overstocked” vaccines, but were not getting them out quickly enough, and could thus risk “wasting them before their expiry date”.

He said that if the disease continues to spread in poorer countries Covid mutations could “come back to haunt” developed and mostly vaccinated countries such as the UK.