Early implementation review of COVAX, implications for equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines and preparedness for the future

COVID-19 is a grave reminder that biological threats, whether naturally emerging, accidental, or deliberate, can pose a significant and potentially existential threat to humanity. In many parts of the world, COVID-19 cases continue to rise, and a concomitant number of factors continue to threaten global access to effective, COVID-19 vaccines. Despite the remarkable advent of vaccines, a glaring gap in access remains between high and low-income countries, even more than two years after the start of the pandemic. These lingering inequities have spurred calls to expand vaccine manufacturing, rethink intellectual property rights, and redraw the architecture of global health governance. The purpose of the doctoral thesis is to document factors that influenced the supply and delivery of COVID-19 vaccines in order to close vaccine equity gaps and improve response systems for global health and pandemic response in the future