Chinese social media giant, TikTok and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have pledged to donate $10 million each to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance to support its response to the COVID-19 pandemic in lower-income countries in Africa.
“This important contribution to Gavi will not only help us to deploy vaccines, once developed, against COVID-19, but it will also help us prevent a potentially catastrophic impact on immunisation programmes across the developing world,” said Dr Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi. “Working with global innovators such as TikTok lies at the heart of Gavi’s public-private partnership model. The results we’ve achieved over the past two decades have only been possible thanks to the unique combination of expertise from our global public sector partners and the business acumen, creativity and entrepreneurship of the private sector. We thank TikTok for their support and the work they are doing in combating COVID-19, and look forward to even closer collaboration in the future.”
Drawing upon the power of its public-private partnership model and by leveraging private sector resources, technology and agility, Gavi is uniquely positioned to support countries in responding to disruptions and challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. From logistics, financial services and technology companies to social media platforms, like TikTok, Gavi’s private sector partners are stepping up their support to protect the health workforce and communities, contain the outbreak and prepare the health system for what is ahead.
“TikTok was created to inspire creativity and bring joy to the community. In the face of this unprecedented crisis, we are committed to playing our part in the global outpouring of mutual support and giving, and providing concrete relief for those most affected. We believe this support can go a long way in the improvement of a robust and sustainable immunisation programme in African countries, in particular ensuring equal access to the future COVID-19 vaccines, making a real difference to the health and safety of the African community in the long term,” said TikTok.
Gavi was established in 2000 to ensure new and underused vaccines are quickly made available to prevent infectious diseases and strengthen global health security. In addition to having helped immunise 760 million people in the past 20 years, with a further 900 million immunised through campaigns, Gavi has also supported 496 vaccine introductions and campaigns in the world’s 73 poorest countries and established global vaccine stockpiles against major health threats, such as Ebola.
