Regulatory Hurdles Impede Congo’s Access To Mpox Vaccines

The New York Times (8/23, Nolen) reported that despite the Democratic Republic of Congo being “the epicenter of a global health emergency,” the country has no available mpox vaccines. Without approval from the World Health Organization (WHO) or “an emergency use license that would speed access,” UNICEF and Gavi have been unable “to buy and distribute mpox vaccines in low-income countries like Congo.” As case numbers continue to rise across Africa, “key players in the epidemic response have grown increasingly critical of the W.H.O. for unnecessarily slowing the effort to get vaccines to Africa.” However, the process of getting vaccines to Congo has sped up since the organization “declared a global emergency,” with “KM Biologics, a Japanese pharmaceutical company that makes an mpox vaccine called LC16,” submitting “its dossier on Friday.”