President Biden Announces Next Steps In Global Vaccine Distribution

The White House has began announcing the next steps in the U.S. global vaccine distribution efforts. After months of deliberation, President Biden has finalized his plan to distribute millions of Covid-19 vaccines worldwide. The administration announced today they will share the first 25 million Covid vaccine doses with the rest of the world and in overall framework of distributing at least 80 million by the end of June. At least 75% of the vaccines will be shared with the COVAX global vaccination program and 25% will be shared directly with countries in need.

The U.S. has already contributed $2 billion to the World Health Organization’s vaccination effort, COVAX, and another $2 billion is pledged to be given to COVAX between now and the end of next year. In May, Biden said the U.S. would send 60 million AstraZeneca vaccines to other countries by July 4th but as of last night those doses haven’t been cleared by a safety and efficacy review from the FDA. Over the last few months, the U.S. has faced pressure to help other nations and several of President Biden’s top aids have gotten requests from allies to help.