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The World Health Organisation has selected Nigeria and five other African countries to begin their own mRNA vaccine production.

A statement from WHO on Friday listed other countries selected as the first recipients of technology from the WHO’s global mRNA vaccine hub as Egypt, Kenya, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia.

“Today I’m delighted to announce the first six African countries that will receive technology from the hub to produce their own mRNA vaccines: Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Tunisia,” Director-General of the World Health Organisation, Tedros Ghebreyesus said on Friday.

The announcement was made at a ceremony hosted by the European Council, France, South Africa, and WHO in the presence of President Emmanuel Macron, President Cyril Ramaphosa, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel and the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.

“I was honoured to visit the Hub last week. And it’s already producing results, with Afrigen’s announcement that it has produced its own mRNA vaccine, based on publicly-available information about the composition of an existing vaccine,” Ghebreyesus said.

“We expect clinical trials to start in the 4th quarter of this year, with approval expected in 2024. We expect the benefits of this initiative will extend far beyond #COVID19, by creating a platform for vaccines against other diseases including malaria and tuberculosis”.

“WHO will work with the companies and the government in each country to develop a roadmap for training and production, based on their needs and capacities.

“Thank you all, and we look forward to working with all of you to make this project a success, for the healthier, safer and fairer Africa”.

According to the WHO boss, no other event like the Covid-19 pandemic has shown that reliance on a few companies to supply global public goods is limiting, and dangerous.