Devex: E.U. finalizes €500M boost for COVAX
“The European Union signed over a promised €100 million ($122 million) grant and €400 million loan to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance Tuesday, reinforcing efforts to ensure people in low- and middle-income countries have swift access to a COVID-19 vaccine. The money will be channeled through Gavi’s COVAX Advanced Market Commitment, which is working to make 1 billion vaccine doses available to people in 92 LMICs. The AMC is financed mainly through official development assistance, and philanthropic and private sector contributions…” (Chadwick/Ravelo, 12/16).

Financial Times: U.K. spending on Covid vaccines hits nearly £12bn, watchdog says
“The U.K.’s push to secure and administer hundreds of millions of doses of coronavirus vaccines is estimated to have cost up to £11.7bn so far, according to the public spending watchdog. The government has signed deals for five vaccines providing up to 267m doses at an expected cost of £2.9bn, with non-binding agreements with two other companies set to bring total provision to 357m doses, the National Audit Office said in a report published on Wednesday…” (Mancini, 12/15).

Reuters: New kinds of loans and bonds could fill $28 billion COVID funding gap: WHO
“The World Health Organization is looking at new financial instruments to help to fill a $28 billion funding shortfall for tools to fight COVID-19, a senior official said on Tuesday. … Bruce Aylward, a senior WHO adviser and its ACT coordinator, said that new financing mechanisms — including concessional loans and catastrophe bonds — were discussed at a meeting of the ACT facilitation council on Monday, co-chaired by Norway and South Africa…” (Nebehay/Farge, 12/15).

U.N. News: To end the pandemic, WHO says $28 billion ACT project is ‘the best deal in town’
“An international coalition aiming to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic needs $28 billion, a bargain price for stopping the damage done by a virus that has run rampant for the past year, a senior U.N. World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Tuesday. … The group has three big targets, Dr. Aylward said: two billion doses of vaccines at least by the end of 2021, 500 million new rapid diagnostics for low- and middle-income countries, and 250 million therapeutic tests…” (12/15).