Moderna Therapeutics has announced that the company is planning about investing in a factory for producing messenger RNA Covid vaccines, in Africa. The proposal will be of about 500 million dollars with a factory capacity of producing 500 million doses of Moderna mRNA vaccines every year.
The pressure on the pharmaceutical industry to make drugs on the continent is growing day by day. Along with vaccine production, the factory will have bottling and packaging capabilities. The country and site location to place the factory will be decided in the coming days, the company said.
Stephane Bancel, CEO of Moderna. Inc said in a statement that they expect to manufacture their Covid-19 vaccine as well as additional products that are listed within their mRNA vaccine portfolio, at the same facility.
The move aims to help the developing countries who had no access to Covid-19 vaccines as the rich countries purchased most of the vaccines from this year’s supply. Having a vaccine factory in the continent will help the African countries to tackle the pandemic with access to Covid-19 vaccine.
Moderna. Inc is the first ever company to plan its own factory in Africa. The company has supplied over 500 million shot of vaccine so far. Earlier in July, Pfizer & BioNTech struck a deal with South Africa’s Biovac to help produce around 100 million Covid-19 vaccine doses a year for Africa.
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