Can the World be vaccinated against COVID-19 by the end of 2022?

— News covered by Quincy Quarry News with commentary added.

Rendering of the COVID-19 virus
Image via the CDC

Can the World be vaccinated against COVID-19 by the end of 2022?

In brief, it does not look likely.

And following is a longer discussion as to why it probably will not happen.

Vaccinating the residents of less developed countries by the end of 2022 is expected to be especially difficult.

Obviously, less well-off countries will be hard-pressed to vaccinate their respective citizens, much less do so in a timely fashion.

Endeavoring to see every drop of vaccine used
A file photo

Fortunately, more prosperous countries are seeing the wisdom of only properly sharing their extra vaccine given their advance ordering of a variety of vaccines many months ago before it was certain that each then undergoing testing formulation of vaccination ordered would be approved for use.

That and the economic benefit of providing of vaccine to less developed countries given the length of global supply chains, not to mention mostly obvious international public health reasons.

Even so, other problems are myriad as well as daunting, if not profoundly daunting.

For but one example, manufacturing capacity.  Production of COVID-19 vaccinations sufficient to vaccinate almost everyone on earth would require an unprecedented increase in the output of pharmaceutical production facilities.

Do-overs
Image via Gallup

And for a related problem, a number of Chinese vaccines are proving to be not all that efficacious and thus a growing number of foreign countries which bought Chinese vaccine are thus now moving ahead with plans for second rounds of vaccination with far more rigorously tested and more advanced technology American or European vaccine. 

Additionally, Chinese citizens are increasingly clamoring for a Western vaccine and such means that vaccines for upwards of another 1.4 billion people will have to be sourced, not to mention that no way are any non-Chinese pharmaceutical companies going to work with Chinese companies to produce needed vaccines given Chinese companies’ long history of intellectual property and manufacturing technology theft.

What will happen if herd immunity to COVID-19 is to be sought by letting infection its course
Image via buzz-caribbean.com

Further problematic, even if one factors in a reduction in need given the immunity potential of those who have been infected by COVID-19 and then recovered, the net number of vaccination injections needed to reach herd immunity is still sure to run well into the billions if the goal is to vaccinate rather than opt to let continuous waves of future infections of COVID-19 run their course and so (perhaps, ed.) provide immunity from future infection.

Further problematic yet is the rarely addressed problem of corruption. 

Problems with corruption include the diversion of vaccines to be given gratis to instead vaccinate those with the means to pay for so purloined vaccine to counterfeit, watered-down, or expired vaccine.

Trust me, it’s only a quick jab
Image via the Healthy Smiles Dental Group

And finally, there is the problem of anti-vaxxers’ dogmatic as well as often intolerant refusals to vaccinate themselves and so leaving them vulnerable to be hosts for, if not also victims of, future waves of infection.

Then again, there are circumstances when thinning the herd might be a good thing.

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