President Abdel Fattah El Sisi participated on Thursday in the Global Vaccine Summit via electronic communication channels, which was hosted by the United Kingdom at the level of heads of state and government, and with the participation of a number of foreign and health ministers.
The summit aimed to raise the necessary funding to provide vaccination for developing countries and rebuild the reserve of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, GAVI Alliance, of vaccines for the coming five years.
This shall contribute to protecting the health of 800 million children around the world by inviting donors to pool resources to help the alliance fulfil its commitments by funding vaccine manufacturers to ensure continuing children vaccine programs.
This comes particularly in light of the repercussion of the novel Cornonavirus Disease, COVID-19; the suspension of immunization programs in a number of countries as a result of a shortage of global supplies of medicines and vaccines; the negative impact of the shutdown and restrictions on movements to provide vaccines and continue immunization programs.
Addressing the summit, President El Sisi thanked the UK and expressed appreciation for its initiative to call for convening this important summit.
He confirmed that the summit comes at a critical moment in light of the spread of COVID-19, which has underlined the world’s need for solidarity and the urgency to work promptly to curb the spread of the virus and find effective vaccinations, which shall be available to all in a just manner, particularly because protecting human beings against epidemics is a global responsibility.
The President underscored the need not to allow COVID-19 pandemic to take the international community’s attention away from other infectious diseases that the world had previously sought to prevent from spreading. P
resident El Sisi stressed the importance of exerting joint efforts to provide the routine vaccines and resume immunization campaigns against fatal diseases that could be prevented by vaccines.
President El Sisi stated that Egypt is following experiments underway to find a vaccine against COVID-19 as well as scientific cooperation to this end through Egyptian research authorities.
The President emphasized Egypt’s keenness, since the beginning of the crisis, to provide assistance to a number of countries to mitigate the impact of the pandemic as a demonstration for global solidarity.
The President reiterated Egypt’s preparedness to transfer its successful experience in applying compulsory vaccine programs which have contributed to reducing infection rates for diseases and child mortality rate.
President El Sisi also expressed readiness to contribute to vaccines’ research and manufacturing, training medical staff and carrying out clinical trials of new vaccines and immunizations.