More than 1 billion Covid vaccines were wasted in the pandemic, says Airfinity

More than 1 billion Covid-19 vaccines may have been wasted due to unequal distribution of immunizations around the world, indecision about vaccination and incorrect temperature storage, an analysis by health data group Airfinity has concluded.

The analytics firm estimates that 1.1 billion doses — about 10% of all Covid vaccines produced — have been wasted since immunizers were approved in late 2020. Nearly 800 million were wasted in the first six months of this year, according to Airfinity estimates, which are based on government expectations, media reports and production forecasts.

Airfinity Chief Executive Rasmus Bech Hansen said more doses are likely to be wasted this year, although vaccine makers plan to reduce production. He said this gives them the opportunity to shift their manufacturing capacity to make vaccines for other diseases.

“Many areas don’t have enough vaccines. Wider vaccination campaigns could produce better protection and save lives,” he said.

Some waste is to be expected with medical products that expire quickly — even more so in a fast-changing pandemic where demand is difficult to predict. But Airfinity’s lead analyst Matt Linley said a significant cause was the donation of doses with short expiration dates to developing countries.

“One of the biggest things reported is that countries get grants that come in very late, very close to expiry, so they don’t have time to use them,” he said.

Developed countries bought billions of doses with their initial contracts, leaving the Covax initiative — created to ensure vaccines reach the world’s poorest people — struggling to get enough vaccines last year.

Many western countries donated their spare doses after realizing they didn’t have enough demand. As more doses arrived earlier this year, developing country governments often faced hesitancy from their populations to get vaccinated.

“If those doses had reached these countries early on, the absorption could have been much higher,” Linley said, explaining that people had often already acquired natural immunity through infection and were not so keen on getting vaccinated.

He added that other problems included doses stored at the wrong temperature, which was particularly important for mRNA vaccines, which initially required ultra-cold storage, and not being able to extract enough doses from each vial. Larger vials were adopted as a way to efficiently deliver vaccines in the acute phase of the pandemic, but are being replaced by pre-filled syringes.

Bech Hansen said some waste was necessary because countries over-ordered different technologies to ensure at least one of them worked. “Some stockpile was needed to protect the world quickly,” he said.

Translated by Luiz Roberto M. Gonçalves