Global vaccine herd immunity will be critical to ending the COVID-19 pandemic. But what is the “price tag” for purchasing and distributing vaccines to reach this goal? Where will the funding come from? In this webinar, we will examine ways to finance this global endeavor, including through the COVAX advanced market commitment and from government budgets. We will also explore vaccine prices as a barrier to access and ways to drive prices down.

Panelists

Susan Sparkes
Dr. Susan Sparkes (ScD) is health economist on the health financing team at World Health Organization Geneva.  She has 15 years of experience in fiscal policy, health financing and health systems reform around the world, across a range of organization, including the World Bank, Global Fund, and USAID.  She is widely published on health financing, political economy of reform, health systems and universal health coverage.  She  has a Doctorate in health economics from Harvard University, a Master’s in economics from Tufts University, and a Bachelor’s in political economy from Georgetown University.

Ben Akabueze
Ben Akabueze is currently the Director General of the Budget Office of the Federation. Prior to this, he had served for over eight years as the Honourable Commissioner for Economic Planning & Budget, Lagos State, Nigeria. Ben is a distinguished banker, accountant, administrator and development economist. Ben is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (FCA), Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Bankers (FCIB) and Fellow of the Institute of Credit Administrators (FICA). He had over 23 years experience in Accounting, Consulting and Banking, including serving as Managing Director/Chief Executive of NAL Bank Plc (2000-2005) prior to joining the public sector.

Srinath Reddy
Professor Srinath Reddy is the President, Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) and formerly headed the Department of Cardiology at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). Under his leadership, PHFI has established five Indian Institutes of Public Health (IIPHs) in different regions of India, to advance multi-disciplinary public health education, research, health technologies and implementation support for strengthening health systems. He was appointed as the First Bernard Lown Visiting Professor of Cardiovascular Health at the Harvard School of Public Health in (2009-13) and presently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology at Harvard.

Hannah Kettler
Dr. Hannah Kettler is the Director for Financing and Partnerships at PATH’s Center for Vaccines Innovation and Access currently on secondment to the Design and Operationalization team of the COVAX Facility at GAVI. Hannah is a global expert in corporate social innovation. She worked for 16 years on the Global Health Program at the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, most recently as the Head of Industry and Leadership Engagement on the Life Sciences Partnerships team. Hannah is a recognized authority and published author on policy incentives and partnership models to mobilize corporate investment in global health. She has a PhD in Economics from the University of Notre Dame.

Fatima Hassan
Fatima Hassan is a human rights lawyer and social justice activist and the founder of the HJI. She is the former Executive Director OSF-SA. She has dedicated her professional life to defending and promoting human rights in South Africa, especially in the field of HIV/AIDS where she worked for the AIDS Law Project and also acted for the Treatment Action Campaign in many of its legal cases. She has a BA and LL.B from the University of the Witwatersrand and an LL.M from Duke University.

Mohamed Mustafa Diab
Mohamed Mustafa Diab is a policy associate at the Center for Policy Impact In Global Health (CPIGH), Duke University. He is a physician with an MBBS from the University of Khartoum, Sudan and an MSc from the University of California, San Francisco. His research interests include costing and cost-effectiveness analyses. His work includes generating unit cost estimates for HIV and TB programs in LMICs, and modeling funding mechanisms for late-stage clinical trials of poverty-related and neglected diseases (PRNDs).

Can Zhang
Can Zhang is an Assistant Professor in the Operations Management area at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. His research studies socially responsible operations with a focus on the emerging economies and underserved populations. Specifically, his current research spans in two areas: 1) healthcare supply chains in resource-limited settings, and 2) scarce resource allocation in nonprofit and public sectors. More recently, he also started working on smallholder agricultural supply chains in developing and emerging economies. He also aims to deliver implementable solutions to make a practical impact.

Moderator

Gavin Yamey
Dr. Yamey currently serves as a commissioner on the Lancet Commission on Tuberculosis. He previously served on two international health commissions, the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health and the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery. He has been an External Advisor to the WHO and to TDR, the Special Program for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases. Dr. Yamey has published extensively on global health, neglected diseases, health policy, and disparities in health and has been a frequent commentator on National Public Radio. He directs the Global Health Track in Duke's Program on Global Policy and Governance in Geneva.

About the "Global Challenges and the COVID Vaccine" Series

The development of safe and effective vaccines to protect against COVID-19 offers the brightest hope of ending a pandemic that has dramatically impacted the world. But many questions remain about how vaccines will be allocated, distributed, administered and accepted in countries of all income levels. This monthly webinar series will share global perspectives on these challenges and offer timely assessment of progress in the campaign to vaccinate people around the world.

View events in this series:

• January 19, 2021 - The Race for Vaccine Equity
• February 23, 2021 - Overcoming Vaccine Hesitancy
• March 16, 2021 - What’s the price tag and who will pay?
• April 20, 2021 - Manufacturing and Supply
• May 18, 2021 - The View from Africa