The Pan Amer­i­can Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion (PA­HO) says Caribbean coun­tries will have ac­cess to the 20-va­lent pneu­mo­coc­cal con­ju­gate vac­cine (PCV20), which will help re­duce the bur­den of pneu­mo­coc­cal dis­eases, of­fer­ing greater pro­tec­tion for vul­ner­a­ble pop­u­la­tions, in­clud­ing chil­dren and the el­der­ly.

PA­HO said that to­geth­er with the gov­ern­ment of Ar­genti­na, Pfiz­er, and the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­ny, Sin­ergium Biotech, a joint ef­fort has been made to fa­cil­i­tate lo­cal pro­duc­tion and re­gion­al ac­cess to the vac­cine.

“PA­HO is com­mit­ted to boost­ing re­gion­al pro­duc­tion of sus­tain­able, in­no­v­a­tive tech­nolo­gies by strength­en­ing ex­ist­ing ca­pac­i­ties and our re­gion­al pur­chas­ing mech­a­nism, the Re­volv­ing Fund for Ac­cess to Vac­cines,” said PA­HO Di­rec­tor Jar­bas Bar­bosa.

“This col­lab­o­ra­tion re­flects our ded­i­ca­tion to en­sur­ing eq­ui­table ac­cess to safe, ef­fec­tive vac­cines that pre­vent se­vere dis­eases and save lives,” he added.

Through this ini­tia­tive, PA­HO said coun­tries across the Re­gion of the Amer­i­c­as will be able to ac­cess vac­cine dos­es through its Re­volv­ing Fund for  Ac­cess to Vac­cines, en­sur­ing more rapid roll­out of the vac­cine at com­pet­i­tive prices.

Vac­cines PCV10 and PCV13 have had a pos­i­tive im­pact on the health of chil­dren in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean.

Es­ti­mates from a 2016 study on the glob­al bur­den of low­er res­pi­ra­to­ry tract in­fec­tions showed that fol­low­ing the in­tro­duc­tion of these vac­cines, cas­es of in­va­sive pneu­mo­coc­cal dis­ease (IPD) in chil­dren un­der the age of five years, caused by the vac­cine-cov­ered serotypes, were sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duced.

How­ev­er, PA­HO said an in­crease in in­fec­tions caused by oth­er, non-vac­cine-cov­ered serotypes was ob­served.

PCV20, which in­cludes sev­en ad­di­tion­al serotypes com­pared to PCV13, is ex­pect­ed to fur­ther in­crease pro­tec­tion against se­vere dis­eases caused by Strep­to­coc­cus pneu­mo­ni­ae (pneu­mo­coc­cus), re­spon­si­ble for pneu­mo­nia, menin­gi­tis, and oth­er se­ri­ous in­fec­tions, in­clud­ing those linked to an­tibi­ot­ic-re­sis­tant strains.

Pneu­mo­coc­cal dis­ease re­mains a glob­al pub­lic health prob­lem. Ac­cord­ing to glob­al es­ti­mates by the In­sti­tute of Health Met­rics and Eval­u­a­tions (IHME) in 2021at least 155,000 chil­dren un­der the age of five died due to pneu­mo­nia and menin­gi­tis caused by pneu­mo­coc­cus.

Of these deaths, 3,345 oc­curred in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean. Dur­ing the same year, pneu­mo­coc­cal dis­ease caused around 243,000 deaths in adults aged 70 and old­er, in­clud­ing 18,000 deaths in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean.

PA­HO said the  PCV20 vac­cine will be avail­able to Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean start­ing in ear­ly 2025, adding that “this vac­cine, rec­om­mend­ed for chil­dren un­der two and adults over 60, is al­ready be­ing in­tro­duced in high-in­come coun­tries and will al­so be ac­ces­si­ble to coun­tries in the re­gion.

For over 40 years, PA­HO’s Re­volv­ing Fund for  Ac­cess to Vac­cines has en­abled coun­tries in the re­gion to make joint vac­cine pur­chas­es, giv­ing them bar­gain­ing pow­er and en­sur­ing com­pet­i­tive pric­ing, re­gard­less of each coun­try’s in­di­vid­ual de­mand.

“With PCV20, coun­tries will al­so be able to pur­chase the vac­cine at a fa­vor­able price, and ship­ments will be re­gion­al, re­duc­ing both costs and the car­bon foot­print. An­oth­er ben­e­fit of the vac­cine, com­pared to PCV13, is that it will be de­liv­ered in pre­filled sy­ringes, sim­pli­fy­ing the ad­min­is­tra­tion process at point of care,” PA­HO said.

BUENOS AIRES, Ar­genti­na, Jan 17, CMC

CMC/ag/ir/2025