The United Nations Foundation is awarding $10 million to CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness, to develop a COVID-19 vaccine.
This award is through the UN Foundation’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund for the World Health Organization (WHO). The fund was set up to raise funds for WHO’s Strategic Preparedness and Response Plan.
“While it will take time to develop, a vaccine is a critical tool for the long-term control of COVID-19,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said. “Research is one of the critical pillars of the response plan, and funding research is one of the reasons the Solidarity Response Fund was set up. I am glad to see funds flowing towards vaccine research.”
CEPI has already moved quickly to respond to the coronavirus, deploying $29 million toward a COVID-19 vaccine through various partnerships. Two CEPI-supported vaccines are already in the clinical trial phase. One of them is a vaccine developed by Moderna, in partnership with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle. The other is a vaccine by Inovio, working with the University of Pennsylvania and the Center for Pharmaceutical Research, Kansas City.
The additional funding is required to take vaccine candidates through later stages of clinical testing and to reach its ultimate goal of having vaccines ready for distribution.
“We are profoundly grateful for people’s generosity in donating to CEPI through the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund,” Richard Hatchett, CEO of CEPI, said. “COVID-19 is a disease which doesn’t respect borders and against which we must all be united. Vaccines are one of our most important weapons in fighting this disease, and this money will be critical in ensuring we can continue our efforts to develop a vaccine as fast as we can to protect the world from this disease.”
The COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund has raised over $140 million from more than 230,000 individuals and companies. In addition to vaccine development, funds will also be used to provide health workers with the tools they need to respond to the pandemic.