Anutin defends Thailand’s decision not to join Covax initially
In a move to explain why Thailand did not join the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access (Covax) alliance initially, Public Health Minister said the government had made the right decision.
Since February, he said, Thailand has purchased 27 million doses directly from manufacturers, not including the 3.5 million doses delivered in donations. In comparison, Covax members have only been given an average of a million doses, he said.
Covax has, so far, delivered 138 million doses to 136 countries.
The alliance delivers vaccines under two schemes – one covering advance market commitments (AMC) for 92 low- and middle-income countries, and one for self-financing participants (SFP).
Thailand falls under the SFP category because it is an upper-middle-income country.
Anutin reiterated that Thailand had made the right decision to not join the alliance initially but is doing so now that the situation has changed, and manufacturers can meet their commitments.
He also explained that Thailand chose to purchase vaccines directly from manufacturers because Covax operations were unstable until recently.
