Estimating the impact of COVID-19 vaccine inequities: a modeling study.
Nat Commun
; 14(1): 3272, 2023 06 06.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-37277329
ABSTRACT
Access to COVID-19 vaccines on the global scale has been drastically hindered by structural socio-economic disparities. Here, we develop a data-driven, age-stratified epidemic model to evaluate the effects of COVID-19 vaccine inequities in twenty lower middle and low income countries (LMIC) selected from all WHO regions. We investigate and quantify the potential effects of higher or earlier doses availability. In doing so, we focus on the crucial initial months of vaccine distribution and administration, exploring counterfactual scenarios where we assume the same per capita daily vaccination rate reported in selected high income countries. We estimate that more than 50% of deaths (min-max range [54-94%]) that occurred in the analyzed countries could have been averted. We further consider scenarios where LMIC had similarly early access to vaccine doses as high income countries. Even without increasing the number of doses, we estimate an important fraction of deaths (min-max range [6-50%]) could have been averted. In the absence of the availability of high-income countries, the model suggests that additional non-pharmaceutical interventions inducing a considerable relative decrease of transmissibility (min-max range [15-70%]) would have been required to offset the lack of vaccines. Overall, our results quantify the negative impacts of vaccine inequities and underscore the need for intensified global efforts devoted to provide faster access to vaccine programs in low and lower-middle-income countries.
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Vacinas
/
COVID-19
Limite:
Humans
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Nat Commun
Assunto da revista:
BIOLOGIA
/
CIENCIA
Ano de publicação:
2023
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Reino Unido